


Nothing Breaks Your Heart

by wasp



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Genderswap, always a girl!Liam, always a girl!louis, always a girl!zayn, genderswap roomates!au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-17
Updated: 2013-05-17
Packaged: 2017-12-12 03:41:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 38,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/806790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wasp/pseuds/wasp
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She gets closer and closer each time and it's like the initial awkwardness is fading away. It's comfortable, easy, Louis' cheek on the soft material of Liam's pyjama bottoms, Liam's hand in Louis' hair when she's not busy typing. Liam can see all the ache inside starting to permeate through her skin, into the corners of her eyes and her expressive mouth. She thinks she's been suffering for longer than Liam has and she wishes she could figure out a way to stop hurting so she could tell Louis too. (Genderswap roomates AU)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nothing Breaks Your Heart

**Author's Note:**

  * For [intherubble](https://archiveofourown.org/users/intherubble/gifts).



> This is for the the loml aka Julia Cunniallingual as a belated bday present and I'm going to go ahead and use it as an ~*~anniversary~*~ present as well | [Tumblr post](http://apayneinthearse.tumblr.com/post/50673603189/nothing-breaks-your-heart-liam-louis)

Liam wakes up to pain shooting down from her neck to her back, something lumpy digging into her spine. She twists and turns, still clinging to the last remnants of sleep, and tries to pull it out from under her. She flops back onto the sofa, giving up when she realises it's just the shitty cushions of the sofa. Liam blinks up at the ceiling, her arms crossed over the blankets, and closes her eyes again in defeat. She didn't wake up because of the discomfort, she'd been doing fine for weeks now, no, it was the very obvious, very _loud_ sounds of sex coming from Niall and Zayn's room. She tilted her head and scrunched up her face - not even, it was coming from the bathroom. Which they all had to share for now.

Liam rolls over onto her front, wedging herself into the crook of the sofa and tries to suffocate herself. It's _their_ one bedroom flat, she knows this, it's their flat and they can do whatever the fuck they want to do in it, including _fucking_ for what seems like most of the time they're both awake and home. She gets it, she's a short-term guest, they've taken her in out of the goodness of their hearts because her fiancé - ex fiancé now - was a cheating bastard and she couldn't stand in their flat for one more second, not even to grab most of her stuff.

She's practically a _burden_ on them at this point, she's been crashing on their lumpy sofa for too long but she still has to pull her pillow over her head when she the now tell-tale sounds of Zayn's impending orgasm becomes too much to bear. Nobody should have this much sex, Liam's sure of it.

"Morning," Zayn says with a broad, happy smile a little while later. She's had the decency to pull on a pair Niall's trackpants and a shirt but her hair's all knotted and messy and there's a lovebite blooming over her collarbone where her shirt's slipping down.

Liam's managed to block most of the noise out by cleaning very loudly and rigorously. She's folded all the blankets and stacked them up in the corner of the sofa along with the pillows and then cleaned up the general clutter that seems to accumulate in their living room. She's seen more paint brushes and socks and underwear and sketch pads to last a lifetime. Zayn and Niall always insist she really doesn't need to do anything, they feel bad enough about her sleeping on the sofa as it is but Liam _needs_ this. She also made tea for everyone because, again, it's the least she can do.

Zayn trails after her into the kitchen and Liam tries not to snap at Zayn. Zayn's her best friend. Taken her in through the goodness of her heart. Liam has no room to talk. Her anchor through the storm. _Right._

"Had a good morning?" Liam asks instead, her tone too light.

Zayn stretches her arms out, a look of bliss passing on her face as she stretches out all the kinks in her shoulders, her t-shirt stretching up over her tummy and the bite mark against her hipbone. She gets down from her tippy toes and settles back against the counter, her cup of tea held in both hands.

"The very best," Zayn says and smiles, all soppy and smitten even when Niall isn't even in the room.

Liam feels it like a punch to the gut and then Liam _wants_ to punch herself in the gut for feeling this way about seeing her best friend so happy and in love. It's not like Liam wants everyone to be miserable just because she's heartbroken and a general mess at the moment. And it's not like Zayn's rubbing it in her face, she's sweet and thoughtful and she _tried_ not to be so couple-y with Niall for the first couple of days, but they're still deeply in the honeymoon stage of their relationship and very obviously in love, it hurt more to have them try to suppress it for Liam so she just told her to quit it.

"Zayn, where's the - where'd I leave my-,"

"Laundry room," Zayn shouts out, her eyebrows furrowing together for a moment. She calmly takes a sip of her tea, rubbing her foot against her calf to warm it up, and smiles fondly when Niall's yell of triumph reaches them from the other side of the flat.

"Did you sleep okay?" Zayn asks, glancing up at Liam through her eyelashes.

"Yeah, I slept fine," Liam says, nodding back at Zayn.

"Love you," Niall says, hopping into the kitchen with only one of is socks on. He's got one arm still hanging out the bottom of his shirt but he hops his way until he has Zayn pressed up against the counter. He cups her jaw gently with the hand not holding his other sock and puckers his lips out ridiculously for a kiss.

"Alright, alright," Zayn says, rolling her eyes as Niall starts smacking loud smooches all along her jaw.

Liam sits down at the little round table and lays her forehead flat against it. Niall's murmuring something too low for Liam to make out - not that she wants too - but his tone is undeniably suggestive and Zayn's starting to giggle in that way which means no-one will leave the flat on time today. Zayn yelps suddenly, followed by a bark of laughter.

"Hey, Leemo," Niall says, turning around to wriggle his eyebrows at Liam.

Liam very maturely doesn't stick her tongue out at him because she is an _adult_.

"Got anything planned for today?" he asks, still cheerful.

Liam _doesn't_ have anything planned today except going back to her sofa when Zayn and Niall both leave the flat for uni and work and she can watch her soap operas with a box of tissues. She doesn't say any of this because she's trying to prove that she's coping over here.

"Thinking of going for a jog, maybe run some errands," Liam says vaguely because she can't lie for shit and there's no way she's leaving this flat today - except to buy more chocolate.

"Great, that's great!" Niall says but Zayn's already dragging him out of the kitchen and back into their bedroom.

Liam drinks her tea and mentally draws up a list of things she needs to do. First thing is to find another place to live and a way to get all stuff back without going back into her old flat and possibly running into Andy. Scratch that, first thing is to buy some fucking earplugs.

~

Louis almost misses the bright yellow post it note on her door. She's juggling with her bag of groceries (this term is used very lightly, it's mostly boxed wine and microwaveables) and trying to fish her keys out of her jeans when she comes to an abrupt stop. She stares at it for a second before tipping forward and smashing her forehead against the door in frustration.

"Fucking _ow_ ," Louis says to no-one in particular. She almost drops one of the bags, stretched too thin from the walk, and rips the post-it off. She sticks it to her throbbing forehead and manages to key her door open before she drops her milk and has to go another week without cereal.

She drags the rest of the groceries into her kitchen once she finally gets inside. The only thing she feels she really needs at the moment is the box of red wine but she goes ahead and starts putting everything in their place. Harry comes over sometimes, less than he used to but still a _lot_ , and makes her dinner out of fresh produce and actually uses the stove for its intended purposes but Louis mostly survives on the stack of take out pamphlets and brochures in the drawers she's supposed to keep her cutlery.

Louis pulls the post-it off her forehead with a resigned groan and reads over the words again and again as if that's going to change the meaning. Because the thing is, Louis' quite behind on rent. She needs to pay the last two month's by next week or she's going to be thrown out of her flat - and it's such a _nice_ flat, she really doesn't want to be thrown out. It's pretty reasonable, if Louis was in the mood to be reasonable (she's not, almost ever), she's managed to stall on the rent for _two_ months now, that's pretty fucking impressive feat. It's gotten to a point where her landlord stopped coming over to talk to her in person because she was able to talk him out of throwing her out for a new tenant every single time. And now this full grown man was resorting to sticking post-it notes on her door and with nicely worded suggestions instead.

She loves her flat, it's spacious and well-lit and the best place she's lived to date (she spent a year or two going from shitty run down pigsty to shitty run down pigsty and there's no mold on the ceilings in this place! It was love at first sight). Besides it's close to _everything_ and she got a great deal when she first moved in with Harry because somebody died in it or something like that. Harry had been convinced there was a ghost living with them but Louis wasn't all that bothered.

Louis makes a sad sound and grabs her box of red wine. She takes it to the living room with her, hugging it against her body as if it could solve all her problems. She turns the telly on and falls onto the sofa, curling up around the box. She's not going to be moving back in with her parents at this age, she's _not_. She can't think of anything worse, as much as she loves her family and misses her siblings she's not moving the fuck back to Doncaster. She's just a bit out of sorts at the moment, she's a college drop-out with no qualifications, recently fired from the coffee shop with the shitty hours all the way across town for punching a dickhole in his stupid face. She's lost three jobs in the last two months and _god_ she's trying but it's getting so hard.

She could probably scrape together last month's rent if she went on some dodgy errands, she could do some cleaning jobs and and probably sell some of the shit lying around the flat. Louis can't lose the flat. She'll have to do whatever she can.

Louis tugs her phone out of her back pocket and punches in Harry's number with her thumb. He picks up on the second ring.

"Hey, I have a box of red wine and a very cute arse. Wanna come over?" she asks immediately, ignoring Harry's _hello_.

"Hi, Lou," he tries again and she can practically hear the sheets rustling around in the background. He drops the phone and Louis' subjected to crackly noises for a second before he gets it under control again. "A bit," he gasps, "busy."

"Too good for boxed red wine, is that it, Styles? You've really changed," Louis says, tutting. She's only half-teasing because it stings more than it has the right to and she hangs up on him when he starts to protest, still all breathless and trying to control it.

She ends up texting him after about thirty seconds because it's _Harry_ and she's not being fair and all that reasonable shit. She throws her phone to the other side of the sofa with a curl of her upper lip and falls back with a heavy sigh.

It kind of sucks that Louis' having trouble getting rent together because her best friend moved out to get in with his girlfriend. Of course, Louis had said she could manage and that everything was fine and that _yeah_ , Harry should _definitely_ move in with Caroline, she's going to be _fine_. It also kind of sucks that Louis was in love with her best friend's girlfriend for a long time - before Harry and Caroline had even met. It kind of sucks she can't tell her best friend anything at all. It kind of sucks that she's the only one that's left alone and miserable and it's nobody's fault at all.

Louis stretches over her sofa to get at her phone again. She scrolls through the list of names in her contact. She's not completely alone, she could call any of these people and they'd be there in half an hour, Stan, Josh, El, Niall - but she doesn't feel like playing Fifa and holding a competition for the smelliest feet of the day. She wants Harry to come over and make dinner like he used to and maybe she still wants Caroline to come too.

"Horan! I've got plenty of crisps, you bring the beer," Louis says when Niall picks up, picking at the hole in her threadbare shirt.

"Actually, Zayn and I were going to -," Niall says, sounding so completely apologetic Louis feels bad for intruding in the first place.

"Uhhhhhh," Louis says in exhaustion, falling face first into a cushion. " _Fine_ , go have fun with your girlfriend who is way too good for you in the first place."

Louis can clearly hear Zayn's _thank you!_ shouted into the receiver over Niall's giggled _fuck you_ and has to try not to roll her eyes. Of course, she only ends up smiling fondly because they're pretty fucking cute. Louis has no idea when she suddenly became surrounded by all these couples, practically _marrieds_ , but she's giving up for the night. She hangs up the phone and starts to strip out of her clothes, kicking her jeans off and throwing it on the floor somewhere. She tries to shimmy out of her jacket without getting off the sofa. She throws that somewhere in the living room as well and tugs the mess of blankets she always keeps on the sofa around her shoulders.

She has a date with a box of red wine and Iron Man.

  
~

"It's perfect, I'm a genius," Niall says enthusiastically, jumping onto the sofa. He's just come home from the warehouse and he's wearing the hideous slippers one of his mates gave him that Zayn's been trying to burn.

Liam's lying on the sofa, she hasn't moved in quite a while, and so he mostly sits on her legs. She tries to kick him off because he may not look it but he's still a heavy fucker. Niall doesn't even budge, just wriggles his bony arse and Liam groans, giving up. She tries to pull her legs out from underneath him where they're not being subjected to bony arse torture. She struggles into a sitting position, peeping out of the snuggie she's been so graciously given.

She's watching Oprah reruns and has been for the past three hours. She knows it's like two in the afternoon but she could probably squeeze in another nap before dinner. Her fiancé _cheated_ on her, Liam has earned the right to watch Oprah at 2pm and nap three times a day. At least for a little while. Liam yawns, pulling the snuggie closer around her and goes back to ignoring Niall in favour of _you get a car! You get a car! Everyone gets a car_!

"Ahem, I said it's perfect," Niall says again, sidling up to her side of the sofa (the whole sofa's her side, she thinks with a sniff). He gets an arm around the back of the sofa and leans into Liam's space. Liam scoots back because she hasn't washed her hair in a while.

"Alright, _fine_ , what's so bloody perfect?" Liam asks, trying to pull her snuggie out from Niall so she can disappear underneath it.

Maybe Zayn's trying to set her up on a date again, like, _yeah_ , two weeks after walking in on your fiancé fucking a girl from work in _their goddamn bed,_ would be a good idea. Or maybe Niall and Zayn are joining their powers to sit her down very gently and tell her to get in the fucking shower.

"We found a perfect place for you," Niall says, smiling widely, clearly chuffed with himself.

The sense of guilt that's been rampaging through the back of her head like a pack rhinoceros filter through at full force. Zayn's her best friend, have been since they were children, they've been through thick and thin together but she's just moved in with Niall and they're still all gooey-eyed at each other and fucking 24/7 - Liam has no business intruding like this. All she's been doing is crying and sleeping and needing regular cuddles to function (not that she says anything but Zayn knows what she needs better than Liam). And now Niall's gone out of _his_ way to find a place for her to stay, more semi-permanently than their sofa, which Liam feels she should've done after a weeks of moping. Liam feels dangerously close to crying again because she's a terrible friend and a burden and -

"Hey, hey, Liam, c'mon, we're not kicking you out or anything," Niall says, clearly panicking. He gets his arms around her, wrapping her up in a hug - snuggie and all - and pets the top of her head a couple of times. "You can stay as long as you like! We love you! We just thought you'd be more comfortable with a bed and a separate bathroom and all. Louis' crazy friendly and fun, she'd cheer you right up."

"No, no, it's a good idea, you did good," Liam says. She presses the hell of her palm into her eyes. She may never ever cry after this, she feels absolutely drained.

It's a good idea, it's a _great_ idea for Liam to move out, away from Andy and their flat, and get used to living without him. Letting go and all that. She didn't realise she'd thought something would work out and she'd just move right back in with him. What could possibly work out, Liam doesn't even know.

Liam sniffles into the snuggie, trying to pull it over her head again and Niall's petting turns a bit more frantic. Liam knows she's spent way too long sat on this stupid sofa, stuffing her face full of crisps and ignoring calls from her mum and friends and _Andy_. It's been almost two months, it's getting crazy. She's fallen into this unproductive funk and she hasn't been jogging or _out_ in ages and a new place might definitely help with that.

"Please don't cry," Niall says, squeezing her head against his chest.

Liam laughs, albeit wobbly, and bats weakly at his chest until he lets go. It's all going to be okay, she'll move on, she's going to be fine.

She's going to take a shower.

  
~

It doesn't take long to drive to Louis' place and Zayn keeps shooting furtive side-glances her way as she drives. Liam's feeling fine, she's wearing trousers that aren't made out of fleece or flannel and a shirt that doesn't have tomato sauce stains all over the front. She feels like a human being and she's ready to act like one. Liam's determined to make this work.

Liam gets out of the car, looking up at the building. It's not bad at all, maybe better than the place Andy and Liam shared near her university. It's more than fine, Liam can do this. She follows Zayn up the stairs, looking around and trying to imagine it as her home, even if it would just be temporary. Niall said Louis was having trouble paying rent and she basically needed a roommate that wasn't going to scam her and take all her furniture like that one time. Liam's got the money for the first two months in advance and she's not planning on taking anyone's furniture unless it's from Andy.

"Ta-da!" Zayn says, stopping at what must be the door to Louis' place. She reaches up with a quirk of her eyebrow, pinching Liam's nose and then her side when Liam refuses to match her enthusiasm.

"I probably could've got a flat for just myself," Liam says, running her fingers through her fresh, clean hair. It's not exactly true, she'd have to live in a pretty dodgy place if she was going to afford that but she feels like she should point it out. She's not completely useless, she could still do things (probably).

Zayn gives her a knowing look over her huge, stupid glasses that makes her look like the artsy indie magazine people who get their pictures taken on the street in front of graffiti murals. Zayn keeps staring at her through her pretty eyelashes of _doom_ until Liam caves. Liam nudges her hip against Zayn and of course Zayn gets that means she's asking for her to let it go.

There's no-one in the world, possibly, that knows her as well as Zayn does - not even Andy, not even _close_. They were best friends since they were five, all throughout their childhood even when Zayn moved away and they went to different schools and colleges and universities. And she knows that Liam does not want to be alone right now. She has a tendency to get too into her head, especially after something like this happens, and she will go through every single detail until she can pinpoint exactly what she did wrong and it'll drive her insane. She needs time to herself, of course, but too much is never good.

And she hasn't been alone in a long time. She met Andy when she was a kid and dated him all throughout college and university and got engaged when she was _nineteen_. She hasn't been with anyone else before or ever since. Liam's slightly terrified and she doesn't have to say it for Zayn to get it.

"Look, if this doesn't work out you can always just stay with us. Forever. Because I love you," Zayn says, widening her eyes so she looks psychotic, " _forever_." Liam finally laughs and Zayn draws Liam in for a hug, kissing her on the cheek when she draws back.

Liam pulls a face instead, resembling a turtle, but that's only because she thinks she might start crying again before she can tell Zayn she loves her too. It's ridiculous, she's a ridiculous human ball of emotions and she's hoping it would stop very soon and she can go back to how she was. Practical, sensible, level-headed.

Zayn flicks her nose lightly and starts banging on the door. "Lou, tell me you haven't died!" she shouts through the wood, reaching out with her other hand to hold Liam's.

"Go away," Louis says, sounding far away.

"Did you forget Liam and I were coming over this morning?" Zayn asks, kicking the door for good measure.

"No!" Louis shouts back, outraged. They can definitely hear her fumbling around now, getting closer and closer to the door. "Maybe, okay, _yes_ \- Jesus fucking Christ, what time is it and when did I agree to this?"

"Just open the door," Zayn says calmly, practised. She nudges at Liam with her elbow and mock whispers, "she keeps her spare under the door mat like the fucking genius she is, though."

It's said more fondly than anything. Liam looks down at the doormat and reads it, silently mouthing to herself _put out or get out,_ She raises both eyebrows at Zayn. Liam tries to tell Zayn that she hasn't made her mind up at all about moving in when the door opens with a loud bang.

There stands a girl in nothing but a baggy t-shirt, her brown hair a knotty mess hanging around her sharp face, last night's eyeliner smudged underneath her bright blue eyes. She squints at them as if she still doesn't understand and rubs at her eyes tiredly. Liam takes a step back. Louis blinks a couple of times before her eyes focus on Liam and then she just _stares_ at her like she's going to disappear if she stops. Liam tries to match her unfaltering stare as brazenly as she can but she ends up flushing and looking away.

"Babe, it's 11.30am," Zayn says, pushing past Louis into her flat. Liam thinks the best course of action here is to follow after her and stay in a two feet radius.

"Why are you even here? Who the hell is this?" Louis asks, slamming the door shut behind them. She winces at the sound, cursing herself and trails after them into the living room.

The place is a _mess_. There's various items of clothes strewn all over the place, Liam spies a man's boxer shorts and a thong and a lacy bra in one corner of the sofa. There's pizza boxes stacked everywhere, empty beer cans crushed and dripping, bottles of vodka and so many random pairs of socks Liam's starting to feel a bit dizzy. She hasn't felt this way since her first year of university sharing a dorm with her first roommate. The curtains are still drawn, the light still struggling through in valiant attempt to light the place up, and the air's all stale. Liam turns to Zayn with huge eyes as if demanding _what the fuck_. Zayn looks away innocently, like she forgot her years of knowledge of who Liam was in order to just shove her in here.

"You need a roommate, remember?" Zayn says. "I thought Harry came over to help you clean up for it a couple of days ago." Zayn picks up a jumper half-heartedly and gives up, just throws it back onto the arm chair.

"Is _that_ why he was here?" Louis asks, falling onto the sofa, tucking her legs underneath her.

"Hi, I'm Liam," Liam says, offering her hand to Louis.

There's a brief pause and Liam thinks for a second Louis is going to _ignore_ her, like they're bitchy little pre-teens or something. Louis narrows her eyes at her and cuts away to reach for the half-empty can of beer on the coffee table. She takes a long swig of it and burps, sniffs and says, "Louis."

Charming.

Liam retracts her hand and sits down tentatively on the arm chair. Zayn shoots her an enthusiastic thumbs up from where she's sitting next to Louis. Liam tries express how much she was going to smother her in her sleep through her eyes.

Because Liam has a feeling that Louis definitely hasn't taken a liking to her. And she gets it, kind of, maybe Liam is just difficult to like - she gets prissy and says the wrong things sometimes or doesn't say anything at all and she never did too well with people ... with people like Louis. Still, Liam doesn't think Louis should be treating someone who was possibly _saving_ her flat like this.

"Shall we go on a tour?" Zayn asks, clapping her hands together like she's wearing a pantsuit and their real estate agent and not one of Niall's t-shirts and denim short shorts cutting up into her arse. Liam's going to give her a wedgie as soon as they leave.

"Is that - I mean, is that really necessary?" she asks, wincing. She's not moving in here, that's a fucking ridiculous idea. She likes the flat well enough, she likes the area too, but she's not living with Louis. She wouldn't even share a water bottle with her at this point.

"Y'know what? Let's go," Louis says, glaring at Liam. She gets up on her feet and starts striding through the flat, the pads of her bare feet almost stomping on the floor.

Zayn hops up on her feet as well and does a dramatic twirl, holding her hand out for Liam. When Liam refuses to get up, she grabs her whole arm and pulls her up, ignoring the panicked look on Liam's face.

"Zayn, _no,_ " Liam says in a hushed whisper, crowding closer to Zayn and away from the mess surrounding her. She tries to pull her arm out of Zayn's tight grip and shakes her head, "nuh-uh, not in this lifetime, sunshine."

"Stop judging a book by her unwashed cover," Zayn says, insistently pulling her out of the living room and after Louis.

"Look at this place, it's a fucking pigsty, a _travesty_ ," Liam says, trying to dig her heels in.

"C'mon, we haven't got all day!" Louis says loudly. She waits for the both of them to come up right behind her before she gestures lazily towards the kitchen. It's startling empty, there's barely a microwave in there - she doesn't even have a toaster. "Kitchen," is all she says.

She walks out into the hallway, nudges open a door and waves her hand as if it's obvious enough what the room with the toilet would be.

"This is the free bedroom," Louis says, pointing into the room.

Liam peeks her head in because she's still _curious_. It's almost empty as well, there's a double mattress against the wall but as she looks around she notices the decent closet space and the placement of the windows. She likes it quite a bit. There's a poster of Elvis Presley up on the wall and when she turns around, Louis' standing in the doorway with a confused little expression on her face. It goes blank when she's caught and she says, "That was Harry's."

Liam edges closer because there's still a couple of Polaroid pictures up on the wall. They're mostly of Louis' former roomate, Harry, and Louis. There's one of them at a bowling alley, Louis perched on Harry's back with her legs around his waist. There's another of them sharing a milkshake, another of them kissing the same girl on the cheek. The last picture is of just the woman and Harry, both smiling at each other more than anything else. It looks roughed up, as if it'd been scrunched up and then straightened out meticulously again in regret.

Zayn's right behind her when Liam turns around and she almost jumps out of her skin. Louis' still standing in the doorway, her head tilted to the side, suspiciously quiet and not in sync with all the things Liam's heard about her.

"It was lovely to meet you, Louis, but we should really get going," Liam says, digging her disgusting chewed up nails into Zayn's arm. She's going to need to get them done, mostly so she _won't_ start chewing them again.

"Are you fucking serious?" Louis asks suddenly, throwing her hands in the air.

"Excuse me?" Liam asks, frowning. She is not a very preceptive or nice young lady, this Louis. She can't just treat people like this and expect them to agree to be roommates - Liam's very confused.

"You're really going to act like we don't know each other?" Louis demands, stalking into the room. She crosses her arm, getting right up in Liam's space, pushing her face as close as she can without touching her. She glares at her, blue eyes narrowing into slits while Liam stares back bewildered.

"You _what_?" Zayn intervenes, getting her face up close and personal too. She looks backwards and forth between the two of them and says again, " _what?"_

"We went to the same college! We were in the same year, I ran against you for Student President," Louis says. " _Liam Payne_."

Liam raises both her eyebrows, trying to shift back subtly, as if the invasion of her personal space doesn't make her uncomfortable at all. That can't be possible, that's _ridiculous_ , real life doesn't work like that.

"I don't remember-," Liam starts to say and trails off wordlessly.

Because, yeah, shit, she _does_. Louis Tomlinson.

It's not her fault she didn't recognise her straight away, though, Louis dropped out halfway through her last year and it's not like they were _friends_ or even acquaintances. Her cropped pixie cut has grown out completely, tangled and messy around her shoulders, framing her pointed face. She doesn't look like the girl that ran against her as Student President (of course only because her friends thought it'd be a _laugh)_ , and she doesn't look like the girl who starred in their college plays and she doesn't look like the girl who snuck in late to class more often than not.

Liam has no idea how Louis knows _her_ name or how she managed would remember it for all these years. At best she would've thought Louis to remember her as the girl who tried so hard and lost the election, the girl Louis beat in a landslide victory.

Liam wasn't like Louis, she spent most of her time looking _forward_ to getting out of there and going off into a university. She didn't do anything stupid in college, nothing that could leave a bad mark on her records. She spent most of her time studying and revising and keeping to herself, nobody picked on her if she didn't talk. Running for Student President was stupid in the first place, she would've just kept her head down like she normally did but Jade was so _earnest_ and if Liam had to admit it, she would've said she had really wanted to win it too. She thought it'd make it easier transitioning from being the freak who was home-schooled for most of her life to a college student. Nobody knew her, there was no way in hell she was going to win and the amount of time she spent making posters and brochures didn't mean shit when Louis decided, like it was nothing, to give it a go.

"Oh," Liam says. She wishes everyone would kind of back off, there's literally a centimetre separating everyone's noses and it's not helping her thought process. "It's not like we were very close or anything," Liam says defensively, crossing her arms. She nudges Louis' boobs by accident but she doesn't back down, doesn't blush.

Liam didn't have many friends in college, she practically only had one: Jade. Louis never paid her any attention in the first place so Liam's not sure why she's so angry about Liam not realising who Louis was straight away. Unless she was still the arrogant, egotistical, self-centered _numpty_.

"You always acted like you were better than everyone else," Louis says, raising an eyebrow, her tone challenging.

Liam has no answer to that because she does - well, she did. Liam spent all her Friday evenings and her weekends continuously studying and reviewing and studying instead of doing normal teenage things like going out and maybe having _fun_. Liam's not naturally all that academically smart and she has to work hard to get the grades she wants and the only way she was going to get out this place was to study as hard as she could and get into her dream university.

Louis didn't graduate from college and even if she did, she probably wouldn't have had the grades to get into university. She never took school all that seriously, she didn't take the election all that seriously either. So maybe Liam's still kind of bitter that she spent all her time with her nose stuck in a book because nobody _liked_ her for some reason and she couldn't figure out why. She was a precocious child, grew up awkward and stilted and said things that got on people's nerves even if she wasn't _trying_ to.

And it's true, she thought acting like she was better than them, that she didn't need any of them, might make it hurt less and then she started believing it and - everything was a bit of a mess.

"And well, well, well, look who needs somewhere to live now," Louis says smugly, sounding like she's interviewing Liam for a job in her luxurious office, holding the power of Liam's future in her small hands, when in reality she's standing in Harry's old bedroom in one of his shirts with eyeliner having somehow transferred to her chin.

Liam stares at her for another second, unable to formulate a response or even just _process_ what's happening right now. Before Liam can remind her this wasn't even the situation five minutes ago - _Liam_ was the first one to bail out of sharing a flat - Zayn grips her wrist again. Her other hand is tight around Louis' and she's holding on with a iron grip, glaring at the both of them in the way Liam's previously witnessed to reduce grown men to tears.

Liam blinks and tries to remember Zayn when she's not so terrifying, like when she used to get worked up over how her left boob was coming in before the right and the fact she used to snack on raw macaroni pasta, and not all the things she's capable of when she gets that steely look in her eyes.

"I love you," Louis says, placating, in the exact same boat as Liam. "You're my favourite out of every one of Niall's girlfriends, they don't even _compare_."

Liam swears under her breath and kicks herself mentally for not getting in there with compliments quicker before Zayn breathed fire over the both of them.

"Look," Zayn says, her voice ringing with fake calmness. Liam and Louis share a look that clearly says _she's suppressing the dragon fire_.

She guides the both of the back to the living room, not letting go of her grip on their wrists and Liam has a crazy moment where she wonders whether Niall enjoys this (he probably does, the sick fucker), like the disjointed thoughts one gets when faced with their imminent death.

"The fact of the matter is, you both need each other right now," Zayn says sagely, sitting down. She doesn't let go of either Liam or Louis. "And, okay, you might not _like it_ but you both know it so if you could get over this cliche movie high school bullshit - that would be fantastic."

"It was college," Liam mumbles under her breathe. She looks up quickly enough to see the corner of Louis' mouth quirk up for a millisecond before she manages to get a hold of it. Liam blinks innocently at Zayn.

"Lovely, that's settled then. Now, let's get the rent sorted out."

~

As much as Louis doesn't want to admit it, and it's a fucking _lot_ , she really does need Liam. It's true that she could just get another roommate and just hope they'd turn out decent and not wake up to them sucking her big toe, she could get another roommate if she truly wanted to. Or she could move to a cheaper location, a different flat, a different area but Louis feels so _settled_ here and she has no idea what she's doing with her life but she knows she wants to be here.

And it's not like Louis hates Liam - that would be ludicrous. She thought she was kind of cute in college and the way her straightened hair would get frizzy when it rained was stupidly endearing. But that was before she realised that Liam had a stick shoved so far up her arse a King Arthur metaphor wouldn't be enough to explain it. Louis could never stand it when people thought they were _better_ than her, from the old grannies shooting disapproving looks towards Louis and her ripped up stockings on the bus on her way home the next morning to stuffy teachers knowing looks when she left college. Most of them thought she got knocked up and Louis' not all that smart but she's not fucking _stupid_ , it would've killed her mum.

Right, so, Louis dropped out of college - she wasn't going to get into a university anyway much less gone to a fancy university on a full academic scholarship like some people (Liam, she's talking about Liam) but it doesn't make her any less of a _person_. There's something so very insufferable about Liam that Louis can't put her finger on, like Liam's constantly using Louis' life as a comparison to how good she has it. Or maybe Louis' projecting.

Louis feels like she's constantly thrown in the deep end and her feet keep on kicking and kicking but she's getting so fucking tired of barely keeping her head above water. Liam's existence seems to remind her that one day her legs are going to give out.

Still, when Zayn said they were going to go to Liam's old flat to grab her stuff and a few extras, Louis tags along. Her ex-fiancé is going to be out, according to Liam, and Zayn promised her utensils. Louis desperately needs utensils, she doesn't even have a toaster. She's been toasting bread on her pan since that arsehole stole hers and a toaster would just be greatly appreciated. Louis doesn't even drink coffee but she has a coffee maker to make soft boiled eggs and porridge. It's fucking sad, is what it is.

Louis invites Harry along so she won't feel smothered to death by Liam's holiness. Zayn gets Niall to come too and they all trudge up the stairs to get Liam's stuff back.

"It wouldn't be, like, stealing, would it?" Liam asks nervously, obviously stalling for time. She stands there in the hallway with the key clutched in her hand, anxious.

"Of course not, babe. He's a cheating fucknugget that stole eight years of your life, we're just evening out the playing field," Zayn says, shrugging. She catches the look Harry shoots her, the onethat tells her she's not doing that well, and quickly changes tact, "and plus, you bought most of it."

"Alright," Liam says, taking a deep breathe, "okay." She turns the key as she exhales and stands there for another second.

"Christ sakes already," Louis says, pushing past her and into the flat. She stumbles inside and after a few steps has to stop and look around to let it all sink in.

It's probably cleaner than any place Louis has ever occupied for more than three hours and there's pictures in matching little frames all along the shelves and drawers. It's looks cozy, not what Louis expected from Liam, more along the lines of sleek minimalistic bullshit, and it - it looks like a home.

"I'm going to - I'll just get my stuff then," Liam says and walks off to where their room must have been.

Louis hears Harry shuffle up behind her rather than anything else, his giant feet taking ages to cross the throw before his chin is digging into her shoulder. It's a miracle his back hasn't broken yet with the amount of slouching he does. Louis huffs out a breathe angrily because she feels like she's being judged for being mean but Harry doesn't even know all the ways in which Liam is terrible yet.

She keeps looking at the photos on the shelf since she has nothing better to do. She feels like she's been caught doing something she wasn't supposed to, like she's invading on parts of Liam's life she shouldn't have access to. They're just out there in the fucking open, she just had to have eyes to seem them - there's a weird sense of guilt pervading her senses though, she thinks maybe Liam's hurt right now is very private. Louis wouldn't want to share something like that if it was her anyway.

"They look happy," Harry mumbles, reaching over her shoulder to thumb at the corner of one of the frames.

And, well, they _do._ They must have been together for a long time because there are pictures stretching from Liam in her school uniform to what looks like a recent paintball tournament. They're both in gear, paint smudged everywhere and Louis can make out the bruise already blooming where the pink paint is fading away on Liam's arm. Andy's got his arms around her waist, smooching her dramatically on the cheek. Liam's bending away from him with a huge goofy grin on her face, her laughter and glint of her engagement ring caught in the photograph.

"I need a toaster," Louis says and elbows Harry in the stomach so he'll move and she can get to the kitchen.

Zayn's picking things up around the living room and glaring at it for a second before throwing it all in the box she's set on the coffee table. At first glance Louis thought she obviously knew which items were Liam's but on a closer inspection she looks as angry as Liam must feel and she's just throwing everything in there. Louis pats her consolingly on the bum on the way out and lets her work and fume in peace. She unsurprisingly meets Niall in kitchen, bent over the fridge.

"This is terrible," Niall says, pulling out boxes of salad after each other. He looks down at them as if he doesn't understand and looks back up at Louis as if she could make sense of all this.

"Is there beer?" Louis asks, rounding the marble counter.

He hands over a bottle immediately, staring at the label in bewilderment before taking a swig. "I didn't know beer could get this fancy."

Louis makes a noise in agreement, looking around the pristine kitchen. She unplugs the toaster and tucks it under her arm. She stares at the blender for a second, thinks of all the shit she could possibly blend, and grabs that as well. There's all these spices and herbs stacked neatly together and it makes Louis still in a quite different way to shiny kitchen utensils.

Contrary to popular belief, Louis' not a _monster_ , she can still feel terrible for Liam and continue disliking her smarmy face. Here she has built up a life with another human being and now they're breaking it off piece by piece - Louis has a reason for avoiding all this shit. Louis turns around and walks out with her blender and toaster.

She came and she conquered.

Louis walks all the way down the stairs and to Zayn's car, stuffing it underneath the dashboard. By the time Louis makes her way back up the stairs, Zayn's still muttering under her breath. She passes Louis on the way down the stairs and she reaches in to tweak her nipple in consolidation this time. Louis would go apeshit if anyone hurt Harry to this level too.

Harry and Niall are both trying to carry the coffee table down the stairs as well. Louis entertains the brief thought of sitting on top of it and pretending she's in Game of Thrones but thinks better of it when she sees how hard they're laughing already. They're almost dropping the thing every two steps, Louis' not going to risk breaking her neck - well, she is but she doesn't want to risk breaking the table if it's coming with them.

Louis wanders back into the flat and revels in the odd silence that permeates throughout the place. It's eerily quieter with everyone gone and Louis' drawn to the pictures again. She takes her time now, it's not like she's going to be caught this time around. She looks at each picture one by one, trying to figure out when he stopped loving her. And it's not just the pictures but little post-it notes here and there, the ones that Liam must not have gotten to disposing of yet, worn out reminders and _I love you_ s. Louis reaches up and scrunches the little pink note and throws it behind her.

There are two pairs of blue and pink bunny slippers besides the sofa. Louis wanders over and kicks the blue pair underneath, steps on the little bunny's face with the heel of her Vans. She wonders if Liam's going to take her slippers.

Next her feet take her, all on their own accord, to where Liam disappeared off to her room. She's just curious as to what it looks like. Louis pops her head in the doorway and then sighs in something akin to relief when she sees there's nobody there. The drawers look like they've been opened and shut hastily, Louis chalks it up to Liam probably gathering all her stuff. Other than that, the room looks untouched.

There's a huge queen sized bed, high and plush looking, in the middle of the room. Louis struggles up onto it, having to hoist herself up with her knees, and sits down. She continues to look around the room, tries to imagine what it must've been like to walk in and find the person you thought you were going to spend the rest of your life with under the sheets with someone else. Louis flops back onto the bed and spreads her arms around, feels gravity tugging down at the corners of her mouth.

It's comfortable and it's easier for Louis to imagine Liam and Andy going to bed, curled up around each other every night, than what Liam must have walked in on.

"Oh, I thought you were downstairs," Liam says, walking out of the adjoining bathroom with another box of stuff. She sets it carefully on the bed and folds the top closed.

"Can we take the bed?" Louis asks, startled to shit and trying not to show it. She waves her arms around on the duvet as if she's making a snow angel.

"I don't think we can get Zayn's car to do that," Liam says cautiously. She turns around, grabs another empty box, and walks over to the closet. She starts grabbing clothes off the hanger, throwing them into the boxes without even folding them as if she can't stand to be here for a second longer than she has to.

"Why not?" Louis whines, rolling onto her side, propping her head up on her hand, to watch her work. "I sleep on a _mattress_."

"I just," Liam starts, her hands stalling on a hanger, "I really don't want the bed that I caught Andy fucking someone that wasn't _me_ to come along." Liam's shoulders draw together, tightly strung and there's a bite to her tone.

Louis sits up on the bed slowly, sucking her bottom lip into her mouth because _shit_. Yeah, that makes sense, and Louis' not even _trying_ to be an arsehole right now and she just seems to be firing shots left right and center. She thinks about apologising, it feels like something she should do, she didn't mean to make her upset - she just doesn't _think_ before she speaks sometimes. But apologising to Liam makes her insides feel like they're going to shrivel up and drop out her arsehole. Before she can make up her mind as to whether it'd be worth it to have Liam's shoulders ease down again, Liam's sighing, sagging forward onto the rack of shirts like the energy's been physically drained out of her. It takes Louis another second to register that she's up against Andy's shirts and she's breathing in rather shakily.

"Okay," Louis says, means more along the lines of _sorry, I'm so shit -_ and hops off the bed.

She grabs an empty box from near the doorway and drags it along next to Liam. Liam looks up at her in surprise, her eyes still lined with red, when Louis doesn't leave.

"Okay," Louis repeats softer. It's not _weird_ that she'd want to reach out and make it hurt a little less, it's just human. She doesn't know if she has the right, if Liam would appreciate it coming from her, if it would even work to share the load though.

So Louis just gets to work on the clothes, grabbing the ones that are obviously Liam's, and doesn't say anything else for a while. She folds them quickly and efficiently, she was helping her mum with her laundry before she was thirteen, she's had enough practise folding clothes quickly enough to go out for fro-yo with her friends after. It takes a little while longer but Liam finally takes in a sharp intake of breathe and leans back. Her nose is still all red but she's not crying and the jut of her chin shows she's very proud of that fact. Louis stops staring at her and concentrates on folding the clothes.

"Oh wow, this is hideous," Louis says lightly, shaking out a garishly patterned jumper.

Liam chokes out a laughter, albeit a little hysterically and her cheeks smush up and she doesn't look like she's on the verge of tears anymore. Louis goes back to work.

They manage to gather up all of Liam's stuff. Liam has to go through the boxes Zayn's collected to pull out all of Andy's things but they've got everything they've come for. Zayn fits everything into the car because she's amazing like that and gets in the driver's seat. Louis shotguns before Niall can even think about opening his mouth and slides in besides her. When she glances in the back mirror, Liam's sandwiched between the two boys and she looks tiny from all the misery she's trying to keep balled up inside her.

"Let's go for ice-cream," Louis says. It's comical the way Niall and Harry's faces light up, like Louis and Zayn are their parents and they're being treated out.

Liam draws her knees up on the seat and rests her chin against them but she doesn't object.

~

It's hard living with someone that isn't _Andy_. Staying with Zayn and Niall didn't feel real, Liam just spent most of her time on the sofa in her pyjamas. This, moving in with Louis, feels like it's suddenly all terrifyingly real.

Liam knew Andy since they were in kindergarten but at the time he mostly just ate an obscene amount of glue and pushed her around in the playground every now and then. It's like the stories in those teenage films, she's knew him since she was a kid, they lived in the same town, their mums were best friends - it was _inevitable_.

They "dated" as much as pre-teens could, holding hands on the way to shops but not speaking a word to each other when they were alone. Liam was home-schooled after a couple of years of being picked on when she was a kid and it made it easier for Liam to deal with the fact her only friend, Zayn, had to move away. At least she had someone to hang out with. They got together, more or less _properly_ towards the start of college. It was as stable as a relationship in college could get but he was there when Liam had no-one else, and even if they broke up a handful of times they got back together the very next day as these things went. It only got quite serious towards the end of college and the summer before Liam had to leave for university. She was in love and she's never ever been with anyone but Andy.

She spent half the year at her university all by herself before Andy managed to save up enough money working at the local deli to come down and join her. They moved in together straight away and that was that. Andy and Liam lived together ever since, for the whole duration of Liam's degree and then for another year while Liam tried to sort out what she was doing while working as a temp at a _socks_ company of all places.

He's lived across the street ever since Liam could remember him and she can still see it clearly, little Andy running around in her house and an older Andy in her bedroom and flashes of him in their first flat and the night he proposed and suddenly he's not _here_ anymore.

Liam's trying her very best to get used to it. She has to, there's no other option. Living with Louis is not making it any easier, Liam considers having moved somewhere by herself all the time. There's a hurricane of mess that seems to follow Louis _everywhere_ , and, really, Liam wouldn't even care if Louis just kept it in her room (that's a lie, she would still care, she would still care so much) but not in their shared living space. But she can imagine how it'd be if she was spending all these hours at an empty flat by herself, how she wouldn't be able to move, _paralysed_ , and thinks things could be worse.

It's a distraction nonetheless, it keeps her busy to follow after Louis with her drawn up list of rules (more like guidelines anyway) and try and get her to agree to them. Louis runs away most of the time and when Liam's busy applying to various jobs, she scribbles messages and draws massive dicks all over it.

And then there's the times where Louis just _forgets_ that she doesn't live alone or with someone that wasn't Harry anymore.

"Oh my god, Louis!" Liam squeaks, slamming her eyes shut and turning around immediately. They're sleeping schedule seems to be terribly out of sync so Liam hasn't seen Louis too often in the mornings (well, afternoon but Louis insists it's morning until 2pm).

And Louis apparently sleeps in the nude. Liam can just imagine Louis running a hand through her morning bird-nest hair, blinking blearily, usually dead to the world before her first cup of tea.

"Morning," Louis says, yawning. There's something vulnerable about Louis just after she wakes up, it's like her brain (and her disapproval of Liam's general existence) hasn't kicked in yet and she just sleepily walks into walls for a bit. Harmless, and Liam doesn't have to guess if Louis trying to pick a fight after each sentence.

"You're not wearing any clothes," Liam says as patiently as she knows how. She opens her eyes to stare furiously hard at the blank tv screen she's facing. She squints and realises that, yeah, that's definitely Louis' reflection in the screen and she's definitely still naked.

"Oh yeah," Louis says, getting a good look down at herself. She reaches over the sofa and Liam can make out the way her body stretches out in a particularly feline-manner, grabbing a jumper one of her many friends left behind.

It smells terrible, like weed and dampness, and it has a hopeless stain in the knit - Liam knows because it was just left sprawled carelessly in their _shared living space_. Louis pulls it on haphazardly, shrugging her shoulders around to get it to roll down her torso.

"We need to talk," Liam says, following after Louis into the kitchen. The knitted jumper hasn't fallen properly at all and the back's all bunched up around her arse. Liam reaches forward and tugs it down, distracted, and almost slams into Louis when she comes to a sudden stop in front of the kettle.

"Uh-oh," Louis says, rubbing at her eye with her fingers. She mumbles something else but her voice is all sleep-ridden and soft and Liam doesn't catch it. Liam's been awake for about seven hours, she's gone for a jog and finished her laundry already.

"The living room is a _mess_. You must have had roommates before, you can't just," Liam pauses, reaching over to push the flick the switch on the kettle for her when Louis takes too long to figure out how to figure out something she does every morning. Louis blinks sleepily and nods along anyway. "Leave the place littered with beer cans and half-smoked joints."

"Thanks," Louis says and it still catches Liam off guard when she's being _nice_. "And, yeah, okay. I got a job at the diner around the corner, doubt I'll have the time now either way."

"We should probably go grocery shopping, we've only got cheetos," Liam says, thrown. She could go by herself and just split the cost later or just get her own groceries and probably leave Louis to starve to death. Liam bites down on her bottom lip, tries to think of a way she can suggest that without offending Louis.

"Alright, I'll see when I'm free, I get my roster tomorrow," Louis says.

Liam had this whole speech in her head about how she wasn't Louis' mum, she wasn't here to clean up after her or feed her but it disappears mysteriously in a puff of smoke. This wasn't how she was expecting Louis to respond at all. Liam feels guilty standing there for reducing her to Liam's _projection_ of her. Louis glances up, quirks up an eyebrow at her and smiles lopsidedly.

"You liked what you saw?" she asks, wriggling her eyebrows so hard Liam's temporarily worried she'll strain something.

Liam has no response to that so she turns around and gets back to her room. She's going to go back to applying for paid internships and not anxiously chewing on her nails from all the emails she hasn't got back.

In addition to Louis' affinity for sleeping naked and forgetting Liam has eyes and can see her, there's also the matter of how many people seem to walk in and out of their flat. There's always someone sitting on the sofa in their underwear, eating cereal and watching the telly. It's become so Liam recognises by now Stan (who graciously puts his trousers back on when Liam's home), Josh and obviously Niall and Harry. Zayn's the only one Liam can count on not to leave stains on the sofa but she still needs to be reminded every now and then to keep her hands out of Niall's trousers when Liam's in the same room as her.

Liam's caught a glimpse or two of girls slipping out of Louis' room but it's always in the early hours of the morning, when Liam's about to go for a jog or late in the night. Liam doesn't know if Louis thinks she'd have a problem with it or if that's just the usual routine she's used to. Liam doesn't mention it, figures if Louis doesn't want it brought up, she's not going to bring it up. Just like the weird silent agreement they've got going on to dismiss the fact that Liam's half-planned wedding is shot to the ground and she's probably lost the person that was supposed to be the love of her life.

It still doesn't explain how sometimes when Liam turns the tv on there's porn playing at top volume. She usually fumbles with the remote, trying to shut it down as fast as possible with her cheeks burning, peeking out to see if the neighbours could have possibly heard that.

And also the fact Louis has a weird laundry system where she waits until she's run out of every single item of clothing to wear and then does _all_ her laundry in a huge laundryfest.

And for someone who doesn't even wear socks half the time there's a frightening pairs of odd socks that show up everywhere, like the bathtub and in the toaster.

She thinks Louis' going to have to get used to living with _Liam_ , as much as Liam is going to.

~

Louis wrinkles her nose and keeps her eyes firmly shut, willing herself to fall asleep. It's too early for human beings to be up and about, Louis can tell by the chill lingering in the air, and she makes it a general rule not to wake up (if she can) before the condensation on the window disappears. She winces, rolling onto her belly, pushing the cold tip of her nose against her pillow. She groans, regretting the move immediately because trust her tiny bladder to have woken her the fuck up. Louis bargains with herself, maybe it'll go away and anyway, she's like 85% sure she won't wet the bed if she fell asleep again. Louis sits up, scrubbing at her face furiously with the heel of her palm because it's getting stupidly insistent and she feels like she's been resurrected from her death but it'd just be easier to get up and take a piss.

She's still fumbling around, squinting against the sunlight streaming in from _everywhere_ it seems. Louis swears under her breathe when she stubs her toe in the doorway, reaching out with her hands to grope around. She bangs her shoulders into the toilet door but the pain, and everything else, seems to be working five seconds later than usual. She doesn't bother closing the door.

There's a loud bang that permeates through the flat and Louis perks up a little bit, her ears would be twitching if she was a dog. She finishes washing her hands, still too groggy to get too panicky about random loud noises in the early morning. Louis pops her head out into the hallway and tries to open her eyes all the way.

"I've got a baseball bat, motherfucker," Louis says, her voice hoarse from the night before. She looks around for her baseball bat but she's left it in her room. Her Iron Man mask is hanging on the doorknob of the cupboard holding all the towels and sheets. She grabs it instead, pulling it over her face as if she could channel Iron Man and blast her way to safety.

She raises her voice, tries to sound way more threatening than she is because she's too lazy to go and get her baseball bat, "You want to try me?"

She mostly wants to shout _TOO TIRED FOR A ROBBERY, COME BACK LATER._

"Did somebody _die?_ Why are you up so early?" Liam asks, appearing in the little hallway between their rooms.

Louis goes through a very brief sense of pure relief because it means she's not getting robbed and she can go back to sleep. It lasts until Liam starts tugging at the hem of her t-shirt and abruptly pulls it over her head, standing there in Louis' flat in just her blue sports bra and joggers, sweat glistening on her collarbones as if she's just been popped right out of a sports catalog.

Louis pulls the mask up so it's resting on her head, able to see better without it obstructing her vision. Louis glances down immediately at her own state of dress. She's definitely not naked, she's got one of Harry's old shirts on, all raggedy and worn out, and _sure_ she's not wearing any underwear but most of these dreams start with Louis completely naked. Louis pinches the inside of her arm, just to be sure, and then lifts her head to stare at Liam again. It's indecent, is what it is, for one person to look like that.

"Are you okay?" Liam asks, her eyebrows furrowing. She starts walking towards Louis, her high pony tail swinging behind her, all that _skin_ just being out there in the open. Louis swallows very hard. It's very early, she's having a lapse in judgment. A little voice in the back of her head tells her she's never had a lapsed in judgment when _Harry_ walked around butt naked all the time.

"You, what, you jog?" Louis asks, backing away very slowly as if Liam's going to spring at her with all her collarbones and boobs and skin.

"Yeah. I like to keep in shape," Liam says, a touch defensive, stopping in her tracks. She wipes at her neck with a fluffy towel clutched in her hand. "I haven't since - in a while, didn't get too far today."

Just when Louis didn't think she couldn't any worse, not only does she wake up every morning at 6am and insist Louis wear clothes all the time, she _jogs_. Louis wants to run her fingertips over the faint outlines of muscle in her stomach, maybe while Liam's spread out on her _back -_

"You should - wow, you reek, you should go take a shower," Louis says, trying to look anywhere but Liam's hipbones jutting out of her joggers or her bellybutton or the droplet of sweat running down between her breasts or her shoulders, _god._

Louis gives up, it's a hopeless cause. She's going to firmly blame the fact that it's very early in the morning, Louis' always horny in the mornings, and starts walking backwards into her room. Liam's still annoying, she just happens to be a very _attractive_ annoying twat and if Louis squints she bets she could make out her hardened nipples through the cotton. She shuts the door behind her very quickly but she still manages to catch the look on Liam's face and the way she lifts her arms to take a whiff, her face contorted in confusion.

Louis collapses into her bed, resolutely keeps her hands fisted against the underside of her pillow. She's not _that_ easy (except she absolutely is) and starts listing all the things that make Liam unbearable. She gets up at the crack of Satan's asshole, has a weird thing about sharing cups, acts like she's the best grown adult in the world and always tries to hoover bits of the flat that's not meant for to be hoovered.

The shower starts and Louis does not think about Liam showering all naked and wet and soapy just a couple of metres away.

~

To say the least, Liam is surprised to find Louis waiting for her in the living room. It's 10am, they agreed to go shopping at 10am but Liam didn't know Louis was _capable_ of waking up before noon. She's still got last night's make up on as well as her short dress. She's thrown a t-shirt and a jacket over it, beanie over her messy hair, high-heels abandoned for her Vans. Louis wriggles her feet, drawing Liam's attention to the little stars on her socks and back to what she's here for.

"You coming?" Liam asks, stifling a yawn into her palm. She grabs her bag off the edge of the sofa, slinging it over her shoulder.

Liam didn't hear Louis come home last night, she doesn't even know if Louis' _slept_ yet. That's the only reason she'd be so agreeable at this hour. She seems responsive enough though, all ready to go grocery shopping and Liam can't say much else. The 24/7 diner down the street gives Louis the oddest hours, Liam has no idea how she's managing to keep up her schedule of partying as well. Liam's doing almost _nothing_ and it feels like she's running out of hours in her days.

"Yeah," Liam says, following after her. She closes the door behind her firmly and double checks to make sure it's locked.

Liam trails behind Louis, her head tilted to the side, contemplating. Louis isn't still drunk from last night, like she is during some mornings when she's stumbling to get to work, but she isn't terribly hungover either. She just looks dead gone tired, soft around the edges in a way. Liam doesn't feel like she'd get burnt if she tried to touch her.

"Had a good one last night?" Liam asks, tentative, falling into step besides her.

She knows Louis doesn't like her. She never did back in college and there's no reason living with Liam would've changed that. It's hard for Liam to tell if Louis' joking or not and when she's too late to respond, Louis just rolls her eyes and so Liam's stopped responding at all. It's fine, Liam's come to terms with the fact that not everybody she meets will like her. It's not like they're fighting 24/7 or being unbearably hostile together. It's absolutely fine, Liam's _fine._

Louis' just quiet for a second, strolling down the pavement with her arms crossed. Liam thinks she must've said something wrong, _again_ , but when she turns her head to make out the expression on Louis' face, her nose is all scrunched up but she doesn't look pissed. She smiles, shaking her head so her hair falls around her face, messy and tangled and a barrier against everyone else.

"Nah," she says, pushing her hair back behind her ear, peeking at Liam. "Not really. What about you?"

Liam thinks back on her crazy exciting night. She spent most of it in her new bed, demolishing her last batch of chocolates and watching Marvel movies until she fell asleep. She did spend an awful lot of time researching the dream companies she'd never have a chance in _hell_ of working at and trying to work up applying for any of them. Liam thinks about lying - she has friends, other than Zayn, she could totally have gone out for drinks with Jade and Danielle and Louis wouldn't even know.

"I watched both the Iron Man movies and Captain America," Liam says truthfully. "And I painted my nails." She cut them short and painted them a glossy sky blue. She applied a coat of the special nail polish that's supposed to keep her from biting on them and so far she hasn't fucked them up.

Louis uncrosses her arm, reaching for Liam's hand. She squeezes her fingers, inspecting them up close and makes an impressed face. "Sounds better than my night."

Liam's waits for the other shoe to drop. Yeah, she doesn't have _that_ many friends and when they do hang out it's usually more along the lines of a picnic or bike riding and not scoring free drinks at bars. But the hint of sarcasm doesn't come and Louis lets go of her hand, walking in companionable silence the rest of the way. Liam runs her thumbnail underneath each fingernail instead of chewing on them.

"I wrote a list at work," Louis says, fishing out a napkin from her socks. Liam doesn't know why she wouldn't keep stuff in her bag instead of her socks.

"I have one too," Liam says, pulling out a post-it note from her back pocket. They both stare down at the two notes in silence, looking at each other with raised eyebrows when most of the items coincide.

Louis picks out a trolley and it has a slightly fucked up front right wheel but Liam holds onto the front to lead it straight. Louis keeps one feet propped up against the bottom rink of the trolley, pushing herself forward with her other feet. She's quick and practised and Liam has no trouble keeping up with her. Liam adds her favourite brand of cereal to the trolley and Louis makes a sound of approval, still kind of distant, as if she's somewhere else. She seems to be slowly breaking out of it though, as if waking up from a long nap and having to struggle through the haze for a bit.

Liam lets go of the trolley to check the price on the Peri Peri sauce. Louis doesn't hesitate to do a little run up, getting both of her feet up onto the trolley and rushing down the aisle with a cheer. She almost crashes into the stacked glass bottles of spaghetti sauce when the trolley swerves to the right but she catches herself in time, her vans skidding along the ground. She reaches up for a bottle, easy as that, and places it into the trolley.

"You're going to break something, most probably yourself," Liam says, walking up towards her.

"Already broken," Louis says, grinning. She rolls her eyes, nudges at Liam's foot with hers and says, "You should try it, let go for like half a second."

"We're almost done," Liam says, pulling the post-it note and napkin back out of her back pocket. She scans the notes, looking into the loaded trolley.

"Aw, is our little Leemo _scared_?" Louis asks, pitching her voice all child-like.

And, well, it's total bullshit. Liam's not in Year 5, she's not going to do stupid shit because someone calls her a chicken. But, it's also Louis and she's got that glint in her eyes and Liam's so _sure_ she could've done it better than Louis.

Liam tucks the notes back in her back, hip-checking Louis out of the way. She grips the handle, makes a show of it and sees Louis roll her eyes again from her peripheral vision, grinning wide. She takes a running start down the empty aisle, almost slipping since she's not wearing the right shoes for this _at all_ , but manages to get both of her feet onto the trolley in time. Liam wouldn't have done this if there had been anyone else in the aisle, honestly, she could've hurt someone, but she comes to a flawless stop at the end, manoeuvring the trolley to register the fucked wheel easily. She's breathing harder than she should be, exhilarated over something so stupid, grinning like an idiot.

Louis claps against another spaghetti sauce, running up behind her. "Well done, good form. Could work a bit more on your footwork though."

"Your _mum_ could work a bit more on her footwork," Liam says, because, she's obviously transgressed back to Year Five, such is Louis' influence. She grabs the sauce off Louis and places it carefully into the trolley underneath the bread so it won't crush it.

"Oh, c'mon, you can do better than that," Louis says, laughing in disbelief.

Liam pushes the trolley down the aisle, trying to keep her shoulders still so Louis won't see her laughing. She doesn't need any encouragement. Louis follows after her shortly and with a loud war cry, she throws herself on Liam's back. Liam goes lurching forward from the impact, gripping onto the trolley so they won't both fall to the ground and upend the thing.

She tries to work up some indignation at being treated like a tree but she's too busy digging her fingertips into Louis' leg so she won't fall off. Louis smells like a stranger's perfume and the ends of her hair is ticklish against Liam's neck.

"Let's try it, the both of us," Louis says enthusiastically, digging the heel of her shoes into Liam's thighs in an attempt to urge her forward like a horse.

"You're _heavy_ ," Liam complains, still letting Louis wrap her arms firmly around her neck, her cheek pressed along hers.

"Don't be a b-word," Louis whines, glancing around at the little boy standing down the aisle with his mum. She wriggles her fingers at him.

Liam snorts because trust Louis to censor herself around small children but leave porn on their telly at top volume for anyone to turn on at any time.

"The ice-cream's melting," Liam says.

That works immediately. Louis hops off her back, pulling her dress down as she goes. She holds onto the front of the trolley, leading the way down the aisle and to the checkout to get the ice-cream home before it melts.

~

Liam thinks she's finally getting settled with this whole arrangement, living with someone that wasn't Andy. It's so different from anything Liam's ever experienced, living with Louis. She's messier than Andy, she still leaves beer cans all over the place and there's crumbs _everywhere_ that she refuses to clean up unless it's in one full sweep. Despite the fact it's just the two of them living here, it somehow still smells like sweaty boys. Liam's working on it though - and, well, it's mostly Louis' regular work schedule that's keeping her friends out of their flat but Liam would still like to take credit.

There are one-off strangers that appear every now and then too, girls kicked straight out of Louis' room after she's fallen silent on the other side of the wall. They leave in in the middle of the night or right after an awkward breakfast with Liam that Louis always happens to miss. Liam has made pancakes for so many people, she feels like a bed and breakfast.

But she's getting used to it, used to Louis. She's agreed to keep their shared spaces as clean as possible and Liam's drawn up a rotor, taking Louis' work roster into account, and colour-coded it as well so they have cleaning and shopping sorted. It's not perfect, they still stuff it up a lot but Liam's letting it go, everything doesn't need to be so perfect anymore.

Still, Liam doesn't think she'll ever get used to waking up in the middle of the night to find Louis standing at the foot of her bed in just her tight t-shirt and frilly knickers, tickling Liam's feet sticking out of her duvet. Liam almost has a heart attack, her whole body jolting in her bed. She has to clutch at her heart and close her eyes to get it to slow the fuck down again.

"Louis?" Liam asks once she's discerned it's most definitely not The Grudge. She props herself up on her elbow, running a hand against her face and tucks her feet quickly back inside the duvet. "What - why - Louis - _go away_ , it's 2am!"

"I knocked on your door but you wouldn't wake up! I-," Louis winces, props one knee up on the bed and leans forward, lowering her voice to whisper, "Look, a girl ... a girl wet my bed."

" _What_?" Liam demands, sitting up a bit more. She must be hallucinating or having a dream or something. Louis cannot be standing at the foot of her bed, trying to crawl her way into the Liam's shiny new bed because some girl pissed in her bed. It can't be happening, Liam refuses to believe it's happening.

"I don't know how it happened, okay? I told her to go before I woke up but she must have fallen asleep and it's like - like, she just started and couldn't fucking stop! My mattress is soaked," Louis says, sounding panicked at the memory.

"Is she still here?" Liam whispers, drawing the duvet up to her chin at the thought of non-consensual peeing in one's bed.

"What? Of course not, I kicked her arse out," Louis says impatiently, waving her hand as if Liam's being slow and arsing about on purpose.

"Oh my god, how old was she?" Liam asks, muffled, drawing the duvet over her face.

"Oh _c'mon_ , it wasn't like that. She's got, like, unresolved issues from childhood or summat," Louis says, grabbing the end of the duvet at the foot of her bed and pulling it down so Liam's sleepily horrified blinking face pops out again.

"Did she pee on you?" Liam asks, quirking an eyebrow at her.

"No," Louis says too quickly. "Okay, _fine_ , yes she did but I took a shower! For god's sakes, Liam, can I just sleep in your bed for the night? _Please_?"

Liam stares down the length of the bed to where Louis' crouched at her feet. It's a pretty big bed, she ordered one the same size as the one she used to share with Andy. Liam bites down on her bottom lip, considering, looking at the way Louis is trying to pull a sad puppy that got pissed on face. "Ugh, fine, get in."

Louis jumps in immediately, jostling Liam's side with her knees. She hustles her way underneath the cover and Liam takes a tentative whiff. She doesn't smell like urine at the very least, she rather smells like the honey and milk shower gel in their shared bathroom and the wisps of hair at the base of her neck are still damp.

"Your toes are so cold!" Liam complains, trying to shy away from how Louis' tucking them against her calves without a second thought, getting comfortable.

"Shh," Louis says right against her ear, warm against her side.

She guessed she'd be a cuddler but this is too much. Liam doesn't move away, not even when Louis' pinky slides underneath her pajama top. "Some of us are trying to sleep here, Liam Payne."

~

Louis doesn't usually fall asleep with a warm body besides her and she's stuck in a state of confusion when she wakes up and Liam's besides her. She groggily leans up over her to catch the digital clock on her bedside, makes a face of disgust when she reads 5:00 am in blinking red. That only counts as a time in the day if Louis hasn't fallen asleep yet.

"Hey," Louis says, looking down at Liam in alarm.

She didn't wake up because she was in bed with someone else, she woke up because Liam's murmuring to herself. She must be having a nightmare. There's a crease between her eyebrows and she looks upset, the corners of her mouth her mouth turned down. Louis reaches over and nudges her shoulder with her hand, shaking her arm harder to wake her up.

Louis is about to pinch her side when Liam grabs the hand resting against her shoulder. She shifts to the side, facing away from Louis, pulling her arm against her chest. Louis lets herself be pulled, spooning up behind her with an amused laugh. She can feel the metal ring of Liam's engagement ring against her fingers. Louis runs her thumb over the finger and keeps her hand where Liam wants it.

She's probably used to waking up to Andy when she has nightmares.

Louis' used to waking up alone but she doesn't want Liam to have to, not while she hasn't even taken her ring off yet. The next time Louis opens her eyes, Liam's gone but that's only what she expected. She stretches out her arms, rolls around a bit to work up enough energy to get on her feet and tries to figure out what to do with her mattress.

~

Working as a temp isn't as exciting as it could be but Liam's looking for employment, not looking into extreme sports. It's going pretty well, Liam's getting used to some kind of routine in her life again and while every thing's not slotting into place by any means, Liam thinks she's doing pretty well compared to two months ago. She wonders every now and then, feeling the impending death of 2pm, if it'd be better if she could have a schedule like Louis'.

Liam closes the door behind her, pulling her coat off and pausing to drop her keys in the bowl. She bought one along with her new bed, lamps, ash trays and coasters and like the last three, she's having trouble getting Louis to use them too. Liam groans as she takes her shoes off, she missed the bus and walked instead and her hair's turned to absolute shit. She's tired and all she wants to do is curl up in her bed and keep her eyes open long enough to Skype with Jade for a bit and get to calling her dad back.

Liam places her shoes on the shelf and slips into the slippers Louis bought. She said they only came in pairs of Iron Man and Captain America, as if that's the only reason Liam gets to have one, but they're soft and comfortable. She shuffles around the corner and switches on the light only to scream and run back around the corner.

Her heart is thudding in her chest and there's blood rushing in her ears because there's _someone sitting in the dark._ She knows Louis' has to be working right now and usually if her friends are over they're watching the telly or playing Fifa - not sitting crouched down in the dark. Liam tries to calm herself down, remembers that she can box and she's taken multiple self-defence classes and the lump in the dark looked suspiciously small.

Liam edges around the corner slowly, peeping out behind it with her hands curled into fists. It's only then she realises the boy was screaming as well, clutching at his heart like he was dying, pure terror on his face. He just looks like a kid.

"Who are you?" they both manage to ask at the same time, eyeing each other.

"Does Louis know you're here? She doesn't like it when people overstay their welcome, I mean, unless it's Caroline but you're _not_ Caroline," he says, suddenly turning interrogative now that he's calmed down. "Are you my sister's new girlfriend?" he asks doubtfully, looking her up and down as if he's sizing her worth as Louis' girlfriend.

"I'm her roommate," Liam cuts in hurriedly. She has a question about Caroline at the tip of her tongue but he interrupts first.

"You're well fit, though. So, you're not a lezzo?" he asks, slicking his hair back off his face in what Liam hopes doesn't think is his attempt at being smooth. He can't be a day over fourteen and Liam has to huff out a helpless laugh at the attempt.

"And you must definitely be Louis' brother," Liam says, walking in closer. She can see the similarities. "How'd you get in here, I moved the spare key," Liam says, shrugging out of her coat. She hangs it up on the coat rack and runs her fingers through her tangled hair. He's a bit of a twat but a lot of fourteen year old boys are, she's guessing.

"She gave me one when she moved in, duh," he says, rolling his eyes. "Do you have a boyfriend?" he asks eagerly.

"I could punch harder than the biggest guy at your school, kid, quit while you're not so ahead," Liam says, shaking her head at him. "That's kind of hot," he says, wriggling his eyebrows. "Do you want a cuppa before I change my mind about letting you stay?" Liam asks, finally noticing how Lot's commandeered Louis' Iron Man slippers.

"Yeah, that's be good, doubt you could make a brew better than Lou," he says. "I'm Lot by the way."

"Liam," she says, taking the hand he offers him.

"I have it the same as Louis, thanks," Lot says and she finds that oddly endearing for half a second before he smells the hand Liam shook like a little turd.

It's only when she gets to the kitchen that she realises she _does_ know how Louis likes her tea. She doesn't when she catalogued it away in her brain, these details about Louis, but she buries that thought away too.

She wouldn't have kicked Lot out either way, he's Louis' brother after all. There's obviously something that's bothering him. Liam also knows that Louis' family lives in Doncaster and he hasn't come all this way for no reason. She's not going to sit him down, shine the lamp in his face and start interrogating him or anything. Louis' close to her siblings in a way that Liam never was and she gave him a key, he was welcome here long before she was and still Liam's only welcome because she pays half the rent.

"Here," she says, handing him his tea.

Liam knows she could probably just escape to her room, it's not like she's expected to make small talk with Louis' younger brother. She settles down in the arm chair opposite, where she first sat when she came to check out the rooms with Zayn, and drinks her own tea. She never got along with teenagers when she was a teenager, she doesn't think she'll do so much a great job now either.

"Cheers," he says, blowing across his tea before he takes a sip, just like Louis does. "Do you know when she'll be home?"

"Soon now, she's working at the diner at the moment," Liam says. She takes another sip of her tea, warming her hands against the mug. "Does she know you're here?"

"No," he says, quieter than before, shrinking back into the sofa. He changes the subject quickly, "How is she? Is she doing okay?"

Liam opens her mouth to reply and realises belatedly she doesn't know what to say. There's guilt lacing through her veins at that, spreading all over her body because she knows how Louis likes her tea and the relationship she has with her siblings but she doesn't know enough to answer his simple enough question. She's fortunately saved from having to say anything because Louis walks in through the door with a loud crash, smashing her shoulder when she rounds the corner like she always does.

"Honey, I'm home!" Louis says when she catches sight of Liam on the armchair. She sees Lot next, his head poking over the back of the sofa and Liam watches her face transform into this look of pure joy when she sees her little brother. It quickly changes into lightning quick alarm.

"What's wrong? Is everyone okay? Did something happen with mum and Mark?" Louis asks, dropping her stuff right there. She doesn't bother with her jacket thrown over her waitress uniform, hurrying over to where Lot's sitting, almost tripping as her foot gets in the rug Liam brought from her old flat. She's kneeling in front of him in no time, her hand against his forehead as if she's checking for a fever, her eyes running anxiously over his face.

"God, I'm _fine_ , everyone's _fine_ , you're such a drama queen," he says in embarrassment, making a big show of trying to get away. Still, Liam can clearly see how pleased he is at the attention from his big sister, his smile peeping out over Louis' hands now cupping his face.

Louis stays worried for another moment and only when she's finally convinced that there's not been a huge disaster back home, she makes a loud _pfft_ noise and squishes his cheeks together. Satisfied with his answer, Louis pushes at his face with the palm of her hand until he's pushed back onto the sofa. Liam can see the way her shoulders sag down in relief when she thinks he isn't looking, too busy complaining about his hair.

"What are you doing here?" she asks, climbing into the seat besides him and getting her arm around his neck, tugging him into an easy, practised headlock.

"You're messing up my hair!" he says in distress, tries to retaliate by reaching for her hair. He only manages to knock her beanie off, not able to reach all that far. Liam knows by now that Louis packs in a punch in that tiny body of hers and it's as hilarious as it is simultaneously terrifying.

"What's he here for?" she asks, turning to Liam, quickly changing tactics.

Liam feels like she's been caught intruding on a brother-sister moment and the little smile that she didn't even realise had been playing around her lips slips off easily.

"We didn't get to that part of the conversation yet," Liam says, twisting the material of her skirt between her fingers.

"Oh yeah, forgot to tell you this fucknugget has a key. Didn't think he'd actually use it though, have you been bothering Liam?" Louis asks, misinterpreting Liam's trepidation. She tightens her arm around his throat while Lot flails his legs and tries to bite her.

"She's fucking _hot_ , Lou, can I come live with you guys. She screamed, I screamed, she threatened to punch my face, it was love at first sight," Lot says.

Louis lets go of him only to smack him upside the head. "Don't swear," she warns.

" _You_ swear all the time!" Lot howls in indignation. Louis ignores him easily enough, proving Liam's gut-burning instinct that this is a well-practised conversation between the two of them.

"Disregard most of what he says," Louis says, "like ever."

"Hey!" Lot says defensively.

"I've got this now, thanks for babysitting him," Louis says, taking her jacket off. She attempts to cover Lot's face with it but he manages to intercept. It's a clear dismissal if Liam's ever heard one.

Liam gets to her feet and nods at the both of them, taking her mug back to the kitchen. They probably have a lot to talk about. She can still hear Louis say, "You ran away? Jesus, does mum know you're here? C'mon, _Lot_ , you're supposed to be the good one -" before the door to her room closes.

_~_

Lot ends up staying with them but only for a couple of days. Louis still has to go to work and so does Liam but he's quiet, repentant almost, and doesn't cause a fuss. He sleeps on the sofa and has breakfast at the same time as Liam and she really doesn't mind having him stay for a little while. He gets over trying to be a douche burger after a day or two and becomes a whiny teenage baby instead.

"Why are you being so mean to Lou?" he asks suddenly, cornering her in the kitchen. He doesn't cut a very imposing figure, he's in his Star Trek boxers and his hair's spiked everywhere like a hedgehog.

Louis' just left for work and Liam's barely spoken to her, she hasn't saidanything that could be construed as malicious at all.

"What are you talking about?" Liam asks defensively, holding her spatula up.

"I just thought you were friends, at least," he says, shrugging. "Has she done something?" he asks, changing tactics.

"No," Liam says after a long pause, trying to figure out what to say. She tries to think back on the last couple of days and what she could've possibly done that was so horrible. She can't think of anything, she's been acting the same way since she's moved in but here is Louis' brother defending her _honour_ or something like that because of Liam.

"Because, you should know, she's fucking ace," he says as if he's clearing the matter right up. "Plays a great game of footie, cooks a mean mac and cheese, can babysits up to six kids at a time and burps the whole alphabet backwards."

"Alright," Liam says, her eyes darting around her as if Lot's playing a joke on her and Louis is going to jump out from behind the counter any time.

"And she left college to help mum out with us and so she's crazy about me finishing with school, and, yeah, okay, the nagging is _pretty_ annoying but otherwise, I couldn't have asked for a better older sister!" Lot says, getting more and more worked up the quieter Liam is, like she's actively arguing against him.

"Uh-huh," Liam says, nodding along, because she honestly doesn't know what she can say.

"And it's not like you're being terrible to her or anything but, like, she's," Lot starts to say, upset, eyebrows furrowing like he's having a hard time spitting it out, like he's having a hard time pointing out that his big sister isn't as invincible as he always thought she was. "She acts like she's tough shit but she's all warm and squishy inside and -"

Lot takes a deep breath, Liam follows him.

"And you should like her," he finally concludes anti-climatically, deflating visibly before her eyes.

"I don't hate Louis," Liam says, blinking down at him.

"Oh. Right. Okay. Really?" Lot asks, looking up in surprise.

"Why do you think I hate Louis?" Liam asks in confusion, gripping at her spatula like it could magically answer all her questions. And Liam doesn't, it's not like she still holds a grudge for losing the student elections in c _ollege_ and it's not like they're clashing all that horribly.

"You leave the room if she comes in, you didn't play Fifa with us and sometimes when she talks your face just goes blank," he says, listing them off his fingers.

"I do not - that was because I had work to - I don't hate her!" Liam says, the defensive one now. She flips her eggs, gritting her teeth when she realises they're all burnt.

She's pretty sure Louis' not all that fond of Liam, still, but Liam's just unsure how to react around Louis. She's so different from everyone Liam knows and she's just not used to someone like her.

"Alright, alright," Lot says, as if he wasn't listing Louis' qualities just a minute ago. "Can you make me some eggs too? I'm going home today."

"What's the magic word?" Liam says, grabbing more eggs from the fridge. She's not trying to sound like a stuffy old aunt but she can't help it.

" _Please_ ," Lot says, sitting down at the high stools at the counter.

"Did you get everything sorted, then?" Liam asks, cracking the egg. "Sunny side up?"

"Yes and yes," Lot says.

Liam's older sister had left home by the time Liam had started college. She doesn't think she'd ever have been able to run away from home to stay with her for a couple of days.

"Louis sounds like a great sister," Liam says, serving the eggs up on one of Louis' old plates Liam secretly loves.

"The very best," Lot says, nodding and raises his fork to her.

Louis takes Lot to the station and doesn't come back until it gets dark outside. She's quiet and subdued, the space between her eyebrows are pinched when she comes home. Liam looks up from the sofa, her laptop balanced on her knees, a wine glass in her hand. She didn't clean up the sheets, not because it was Louis' job but because she didn't know if Lot was going to go home or not.

Liam intuitively settles her laptop and wine glass on the coffee table, just in time too. Louis collapses onto the sofa next to Liam, face-first. she folds herself into the blankets Lot had been using and disappears behind it, pulling it over her head. Liam looks down at the strands of her hair peeking out and bites down on her bottom lip.

"Is he okay?" Liam asks, reaching out with a hand, hovering above Louis' head.

Louis' quiet for a moment but she says, "Yeah, he's going to be fine," in a muffled voice.

Liam can just about guess how much Louis misses her family all the time and how happy she seemed to be when Lot was here, even if she made him go back in the end. Liam rests her hand gently against the back of Louis' head, moving with her when Louis turns her face so she's not speaking into the sofa.

"He's a good kid," she says and she sounds fiercely proud instead of defensive.

"Yeah," Liam says, her thumb smoothing Louis' hair, touching the tip of her ear. Louis makes a noise, not exactly in misery, but stays close. She falls asleep, curled up against Liam's thigh, and Liam thinks she could've just put her head in her lap if she wanted to, it would've been a lot more comfortable.

~

Louis misses the loud knocking on the door, too busy shouting at Stan through her headphone. She stops mid-sentence about what she's going to do to his mother's taint, twisting her head towards the door to hear better. She pauses the game, pulling her headphone off and throwing her controller onto the table despite Stan's protests. Louis hasn't had angry neighbours banging on her door that much lately and she's not sure if she should be on guard for this or not.

She looks through the peephole, getting up on her tippy toes to do so, and sighs out loud in relief when she sees who it is. She didn't know Liam forgot her key. Louis didn't even know she'd be back tonight, she just said she was going to go out with a couple of her friends. Louis was prepared for playing video games with Stan until 4am in the morning when bad decisions manifested into physical pains. As soon as Louis opens the door, Liam kind of lunges and falls at her.

"Louis, Louis, Louuuuuuuuuis," Liam says urgently, slurring her name together until all she's doing is tapping her tongue against her front teeth. She wraps her arms around Louis' neck, hugging her close and she doesn't so much as smell as alcohol as she smells like she's been dunked in a vat.

"M'right here," Louis says through gritted teeth, holding the both of them up with difficulty since Liam's decided using her own feet was a stupid idea. Louis manages to close the door behind her without dropping Liam or herself.

Louis grunts as she starts to haul Liam in, dragging the both of them at this point towards the sofa so she won't fall into the temptation of dropping Liam on the floor. It would be hilarious. She'd be the one waking up in the corridor sick and sore for a change. Louis doesn't though, she holds her tight until they get to the sofa and drops her into it to the best of her abilities.

"What is it?" Louis asks, grabbing Liam's hand when they reach for her face.

"So important," Liam says in a hushed whisper, her brown eyes huge as she looks up at Louis. She outstretches her arms and makes a vague motion that's reminiscent of the universal grabby hands. Except a lot less coordinated. "C'mere," Liam says indignantly, her cheeks flushed a rosy pink, her hair - especially straightened for this occasion - all frizzled up by now.

Louis narrows her eyes at her, suspicious, but is unable to resist. She guesses in some other universe, Liam would be considered quite a cute drunk. Louis' a fucking mess, usually, and she hasn't gotten as drunk as Liam in a while. As soon as Louis is in reaching distance again, Liam grabs her shirt, bunching the material at her belly in her fist and pulling her down besides her with surprising strength. Louis makes a sound of surprise, landing on the sofa with an exhale. She doesn't have time to catch her breath before Liam's snuggling in, wrapping her arms around her waist and rubbing her nose against Louis' collarbone.

"What's so important, Liam?" Louis asks, huffing out a laugh in disbelief. Who would have _guessed_ Liam to be a grabby, affectionate little drunk. Louis squirms, trying to smother her laughter because it seems Liam's only grabbing onto the parts of her that are the most ticklish.

Liam lifts her head suddenly, looking into Louis' eyes as if she's been reminded of this oh so very important task. She lets go of Louis only to grab her face this time, squishing her cheeks together until her lips pout out ridiculously at Liam.

"You're so pretty," she says, smiling, her eyes squinting in the corners.

"Thanks," Louis says, amused, an answering smile fighting through the way Liam's squishing her cheeks. She doesn't think Liam has any idea what she's saying and oh, Louis is going to take the fucking _piss_ out of her in the morning.

"And you have a _lovely_ smile," Liam continues, hiccoughs once. Louis makes no move whatsoever at all to interrupt but Liam hushes her anyway. "And - shh, no, this is the most important bit!" Liam says, distressed. She holds a finger up as if to emphasise her point but it wavers in front of their faces and boops Louis on the nose instead which sets off a fresh set of giggles.

Louis tries to wriggle out from under her because Liam's shaking silently on top of her and she's so _drunk_. "You're so fucked," Louis says, doesn't pretend she's exasperated instead of fond when Liam probably won't be able to tell.

"But the thing is," Liam says, still holding on. "Your arse is very good," she says very, _very_ seriously. She looks straight into Louis' eyes as if imploring for her to understand the sincerity, the _brevity_ of her words. "The best one in the world, science said, probably, it looks like it'd be really nice to sleep on."

" _Liam_ ," Louis says between gasping breathes, laughing so hard she's not even making any sounds. She glances down at Liam's utmost genuine face, a little frown dipping between her eyebrows at the fact Louis is not taking this very seriously. Louis only laughs harder, her stomach _aching_ , and hugs Liam's face to her chest so she won't have to look at it any more. "Aw, babes, you're _so_ drunk. We need to get like a pint of water and a banana in you."

"Don't want to," Liam says, rubbing her cheek against the bit of skin peeking out of the collar of Louis' t-shirt again.

"God, we need to get you drunk more often. You actually like me," Louis says to no-one in particular. Liam's not listening, she's trying to fall asleep on top of Louis as a bed.

Louis manages to get Liam to drink two cups of water and three bites of a banana before she finally falls asleep.

"I'm never drinking again," Liam says the next morning, slumped over the kitchen counter.

"That's the motto," Louis says, slapping her arse on the way out to work.

~

Liam knows Louis was taking care of her after Jade and Jesy unceremoniously dumped her arse home. She doesn't remember all the details but she knows she would've felt a lot worse in the morning if it had not been for Louis. And it just becomes a bit _easier,_ to be each other's company, every day and not have to pretend every thing is okay.

Liam would work outside in the living room in the guise of using the telly as a background noise. When Louis comes home and she's more tired than usual and she's not going out with the lads or Harry comes over badgering her to have dinner with them, she'll curl up on the sofa besides Liam. She's always quieter than usual, like she leaves one Louis at the door and recharges on the sofa.

She gets closer and closer each time and it's like the initial awkwardness is fading away. It's comfortable, easy, Louis' cheek on the soft material of Liam's pyjama bottoms, Liam's hand in Louis' hair when she's not busy typing. Sometimes they just watch the telly and sometimes Louis doesn't have to have a quick nap before dinner or a night out.

Liam can see all the ache inside starting to permeate through her skin, into the corners of her eyes and her expressive mouth. She thinks she's been suffering for longer than Liam has and she wishes she could figure out a way to stop hurting so she could tell Louis too.

This one time, Liam's chewing on the nail of her thumb, working on something for Caroline until 3am in the morning, when Louis stumbles through the door. Liam looks up in surprise, she didn't know it was so late and mostly she didn't expect Louis to be home tonight. She stumbles out of her heels and Liam quickly places her laptop on the arm of the sofa. Louis literally falls back onto the sofa, her feet over the edge of the other arm. She shuffles up closer so her head is resting firmly in Liam's lap.

"Hey," Liam says, looking down at her. Louis closes her eyes and Liam can see how her eyeshadow's started to crease and smudge and the lovebite sucked underneath her jaw but she can also see how the corners of her mouth are on the verge of trembling and the effort it's causing her to keep her face blank.

"Hi," Louis says, her voice hoarse. She reaches down to tug at her tight dresss where it's ridden up. She gives up after five seconds and lets her hand fall off the side of the sofa, exhausted.

"Too much to drink?" Liam asks even though that's more of the symptom than the cause.

Louis laughs at that, still drunk but sober enough to the irony in that. She opens her eyes slowly, her eyelashes thick with mascara, and stares up at Liam.

"Why are you still up?" she asks softly, turning on her side and curling her knees in, trying to disappear right in front of Liam's eyes.

"Working on some coding for Caroline's website," Liam says, Caroline's name sounding foreign in her mouth, like someone else's toothbrush.

"I thought you went to uni for marketing," Louis says, hiding her face against Liam's belly. Liam can already see the dark smudges of eye shadow and the last remnants of lipstick on the white cotton of her shirt but she rests her hand against the junction of Louis' neck and shoulder anyway, letting her.

"I did, this is what I do for fun," Liam says, realises belatedly how pathetic it sounds and finds she doesn't really care either way.

"How'd you get talking to Caroline?" Louis asks, muffled against Liam's belly, her lips moving against the thin fabric.

"I helped Zayn with the gallery website and she liked it," Liam says, apologetic. "I'm not doing a whole lot but her web design team sucks."

Louis makes a sound of affirmation. She rolls onto her back again, her face turned up towards Liam again. She still has her eyes closed and she murmurs, "M'gonna sleep real quick."

"Lou, you shouldn't sleep with make-up on," Liam says, her thumb brushing against the sensitive skin under her eyes, over the flecks of shadow fall out. "It's bad for your skin."

Louis shrugs and doesn't reply. Liam sighs and leans forward to place her laptop onto the coffee table. She lifts Louis' head off her lap and wriggles out while Louis makes another noise of complaint. Liam hushes her and goes off to the bathroom to find her make-up remover and some cotton pads. When she comes back a minute later, Louis' pushed herself up into a sitting position, one of her legs pulled up against her body, leaning forward to stare at Liam's laptop.

Liam sits down next to her and glances at the laptop screen. It's the page dedicated to the designer of the fashion line, Caroline's smiling at the camera taking up most of the page. Liam reaches forward and slowly closes the lid of her laptop, settling back down besides Louis.

"Close your eyes," Liam says unnecessarily, Louis' already shut them.

Liam starts to gently wipe at Louis' eyes, being much more careful than she is with her own make-up. She works it in until her mascara has loosened, wiping everything away with more cotton pads. Louis stays still, she could be sleeping if it wasn't for the regular hitches in her breathe, like she's stamping down on anything before it can escape her mouth.

"Thanks," Louis says, her eyes fluttering open once Liam's done. Her blue eyes look vulnerable and not just because Liam's wiped away Louis' night.

"No problem," Liam says. "We should both probably go to bed."

Liam grabs her laptop, unplugging it from the charger and the bottle of make-up remover. She grabs Louis' hand when she waves it around, tugging on it to get Louis to get off the sofa so she can fall asleep in her bed for once. Liam doesn't let go of her hand, leads her down the hallway to their bedrooms because she doesn't think Louis might make it if she let go.

Louis shuffles behind her, her feet bare and cold against the ground.

"Well," Liam says, "this is me."

Louis laughs, muffling it against Liam's arm. She's still laughing, warm against Liam's ear now, when she wraps her arms around Liam in a hug. "Goodnight," she says. Liam hugs her back with one arm, squeezing tight before letting go.

She watches Louis walk off into her room and disappear into the dark before she even gets her hand on the doorknob and turns.

~

The day's been stretching out for eternity and Louis' just glad to be back home. She feels like she's been run over by a monster truck, her body is _aching_ , her feet feeling like they're crumbling away in her work shoes, and she's just completely drained. She's been running on three hours of sleep the whole time and she wants to strip her clothes off and curl up under her duvet and sleep the next week away.

Her day started with a congratulatory text to Harry and Caroline on their anniversary which, she probably would've had trouble remembering if it was her own. She didn't expect a reply, if she knew her friends she knew they'd be naked and busy by now. Her shift at the diner started at the ungodly hour of 6am and the whole day just went downhill from there.

She passes the key bowl and has to backtrack, remembering to drop her keys in this time. Liam usually gets home before she does, she doesn't really seem to go anywhere besides work and Zayn's place.

The light's are off in the living room, which probably means Liam's out. Louis flicks them back on, taking her jacket off and throwing it over the back of the sofa. It's only then she realises that Liam's curled up on the sofa, blinking rapidly at the sudden brightness.

"Calm down, I just forgot for a sec," Louis says, grabbing her jacket off the back of the sofa and hanging it next to her coat.

"Huh?" Liam asks, her throat sounding hoarse.

"Are you okay?" Louis says, rounding the sofa to stare down at Liam. She's still in her work clothes and her mascara's running, her nose still ruddy red.

"I'm fine, I fell asleep in the living room. Sorry, I know I kept harping on about the shared living space being _shared_ and all that," Liam says, pushing her hair out of her face. She struggles into a sitting position, her work clothes all wrinkled.

"Bullshit you're fine, your eyes are as red as the devil's dick," Louis says, getting into seat next to her.

It makes Liam laugh, startles it right out of her and she still looks completely miserable, clutching at her hands, but she laughs all the same.

"I just - somebody asked me about it at work and - I thought I should take the ring off about now," Liam says, and Louis can now see the way she's twisting the ring round and round her finger. "But I _can't_."

"Like physically or," Louis stops talking and Liam laughs again, her eyes still a bit tear-y and heartbreakingly sad.

"I'm such an idiot," Liam says, rubbing at her eyes with the palm of her hands.

"Okay, c'mon," Louis says, shuffling closer. She grabs the edge of apron that's part of her uniform and starts to wipe at her face. She gets most of the mascara off, gentle against Liam's face and runs the pad of her thumb against the heated skin around her eyes. "You're not being stupid, it's just taking some time, that's all."

Liam sniffs and twists her engagement ring one last time.

"It's just a ring, I should be able to take it off," Liam says, upset and trying to cram it all back inside her again.

"Fuck if it's just a ring," Louis says, "forget about it for now. You're being way too hard on yourself. What do you usually do when you're feeling down?"

"I usually think about babies with moustaches," Liam says in a very small voice, her chin against her chest, trying to get swallowed up by the sofa.

"Liam," Louis says, unable to say anything else, driven speechless. She falls back onto the sofa besides her, starting to laugh, not only because now she can't do anything but imagine babies with moustaches now but the fact that is Liam's go to. It's not drinking an obscene amount of tequila or going for a walk or talking to her mum, it's _thinking about tiny little infants with facial hair_.

Liam starts to giggle along too, her shoulders shaking. Louis jostles into her side, trying to smother the sounds against her shoulder and only encouraging Liam to laugh harder. "You're such a fucking dork," Louis says and reaches over to try and pinch her nipple.

Liam squeals, grabbing at her wrists and trying to wriggle away. "It works!" she says defensively, still smiling quite a bit wider. She doesn't let go of Louis' wrist even after she's given up on tweaking her nipple, her cheeks going up so her eyes turn into happy squints.

"We can watch Strictly and start on the pie I brought home from work," Louis says, slumping against Liam after her bout of giggles ends too.

"Which pie?" Liam asks, perking up. She still looks sad and soggy around the edges but she sounds hopeful.

"Apple," Louis says, struggling up off the sofa. She managed to snatch the best one before Michael could get in. She walks over to where she's placed it on the drawer and brings it over to the coffee table, breathing in deeply. "Get changed and I'll meet you back here in five with forks."

Liam shuffles off into her room in her slippers and Louis goes off to her room to change into her pyjamas as well. She doesn't know how long Liam's been in the living room, unable to even get up to go to her room because Louis knows for a fact Liam would never voluntarily be crying in front of _Louis_ of all people.

When Liam resurfaces, she's thrown her hair in a pony tail and she's in a baggy batman raglan tee with matching pyjama bottoms. She curls up on the sofa and silently accepts the fork Louis hands her.

"Wow, that's worse than Zayn's dancing," Louis says, the pie balanced on her belly, leaning right up against the sofas so they can both eat like lazy fuckers. Louis shakes her head at the telly in disbelief, shovelling another forkful into her mouth.

Liam snorts, digging her fork in, "she's not _that_ bad,"

~

Louis decides to skip a night out with the lads when she sees Zayn sitting on their sofa, her overnight bag resting at her feet. She raises an eyebrow, hopping right over and jumping over the back of the sofa and crashing between Liam and Zayn. Zayn makes a noise of hurt, wriggling her knee out from underneath Louis and glaring at her.

"Did you have a fight with Niall?" Louis asks, ignoring her to curl her arms around her.

"No, we're just having a girls' night in and - stop it, Louis stop," Zayn says, trying to detach Louis' face from where she's comfort nuzzling her.

"Zayn brought face masks and DVDs and we have chocolate," Liam says, Louis' foot lodged against her ribs in what can't be a very comfortable position.

"Can't get any better than that, be back in a sec," Louis says and disappears into her room.

She digs around her room for something clean to wear and fishes out a pair of yellow shorts. When she wanders back into the living room, Zayn's spread out against the sofa, her head resting against Liam's thigh, at ease and comfortable with each other, like sisters. Liam's propped herself up against the side of the sofa, running her hand absent-mindedly through Zayn's shiny, knot-free hair and tugging every once in a while to tell Zayn how unfair it was.

"And I brought my face masks," Zayn says, fishing them out of her bag. Zayn puts hers on straight away, practised, not even needing a mirror. It's probably why Zayn's going to have the skin of a fifteen year old when she's thirty.

Liam puts hers on crookedly but she got all her eyes and lips in the right hole, which Louis has to say is impressive enough for her. Louis nudges Liam's thigh with her knuckles and tilts her chin upwards, presenting her face. Liam carefully puts the face mask on Louis' face as well, smoothing out the edges and bumps towards her hairline with her fingertips. Her hands are steady and gentle against her face and she's frowning a little in concentration and up this close Liam can see the little dents her teeth have left in the plump swell of her bottom lip.

"What's this supposed to do?" Louis asks, wrinkling her nose as soon as Liam moves back. Liam reaches forward to smooth the mask down over her nose again and Louis acts like that wasn't her intention. Not consciously anyway.

"I have no spiffing clue," Liam says, trying to fix her own crooked mask.

Zayn rolls her eyes at the both of them but doesn't bother explaining. "Okay, the choices are Bridget Jones, Love Actually and the Notebook. Ah, shit, no, Niall re-watched it last night and didn't bother putting it back in the case, _fucker_."

"You know he watched that movie with me every night for like two weeks when I was sleeping on your sofa," Liam says, reaching for a chocolate. She bites into it halfway, checks the filling and pops the whole thing in your mouth.

"Trust me, it wasn't for your benefit," Zayn says, chucking the empty DVD case into her bag.

"I saw this guy who looked _just_ like Loki at work today, but like a dirty hipster version," Louis says, out of the blue. "Let's watch Thor."

Zayn makes a noise of approval and clambers up to rummage through the stack of DVDs in their flat. Liam and Louis' have somehow got all mixed up and they've got doubles of some movies which proves helpful when one gets too scratched.

"And then Bridget Jones," Louis says because that's a fucking classic and a sleep over wasn't a sleep over without Bridget Jones.

"Ugh, coconut," Liam says, pulling a face.

Louis opens her mouth expectantly, otherwise occupied trying to dig the remote from underneath the cushions. Liam leans over to place the chocolate in her ready mouth. Louis closes her lips around her fingers, a lot more suggestively than she'd intended to, and has to duck down in guise of finding the remote. When she settles back besides Liam, starting the movie with a click, she can make out the faint flush on her cheeks.

Zayn ends up falling asleep first, only halfway through the movie, slumped over where Louis' sitting between the two of them. She slides down onto her lap, curling up on the sofa. Louis touches the very tip of her finger to her long eyelashes but she doesn't wake up.

"Get the sharpie," Louis whispers and Liam almost falls over herself to get it. "You can do the honours."

Liam doesn't hesitate to draw a monobrow, joining her perfectly shaped eyebrows together and even bringing it down in the middle so Zayn's got more of a seagull than eyebrows. Louis tries to stifle her laugh, almost choking on it and motions for Liam to hand over her pen. She draws a pretty standard moustache and she's in the process of drawing across her unfairly gorgeous cheekbone when Zayn's eyes flutter open.

They remain frozen for a moment, Liam and Louis leaning over Zayn's face with matching little _shit_ faces. Zayn stares at the both of them, her eyes flicking between the sharpie in Louis' hand and the faces their making. The moment breaks and Zayn makes a sound that make both Liam and Louis jump off the sofa, pushing and pulling at each other to start running away.

"Oh, fuck," Liam says between gasping breathes of laughter, holding onto Louis' hand as they run down the short hallway and barricade themselves in the bathroom.

Louis locks the door but holds onto the doorknob just in case. "What a way to die," she says, jumping when she feels Zayn's fingers trying to swipe at them from underneath the door.

Liam climbs into the dry bathtub, tucking her legs against herself. Louis joins her, sitting on the other side, their feet sandwiched between each other.

"You fuckers better sleep in there," Zayn threatens, banging on the door.

They don't end up having to sleep in there. Both of them don't say anything, trying to communicate without making a noise. Louis steps on Liam's toes and Liam sandwiches her feet between hers and they try to out stamp each other, stifling sounds of hurt when their knees bang against the edge of the bathtub and each other. Louis finally slumps against the back of the tub, stretching her legs out over to Liam's side. Liam lifts her arms to fit her legs in and rests her hands on the knob of her knee, tracing the little scars she's acquired over the years from trying to shave in a rush. They stay like that for a little while, silent, and Louis doesn't feel like she needs to fill the silence at all.

But they can predict how long it would eventually take Zayn to fall asleep again and they sneak out to see her passed out on the sofa, Bridget Jones playing as background noise. Liam throws a blanket over her shoulders and Louis graciously does not finish drawing the dick on her cheek.

~

Niall comes over the next morning to pick Zayn up, a pair of her floral sunglasses perched on his nose and definitely looking worse for wear. He groans when the door slams shut behind him and shuffles into the living room. Liam's kneeling between Zayn's legs, trying to help Zayn get the rest of the sharpie with a cotton pad and her bottle of Bioderma. Niall kisses her shiny cheek and snorts at the monobrow still drawn on.

"Hey, Niall," Louis says emerging from the kitchen with two cups of tea. She hands one to Liam, dodges the kick Zayn sends her way easily enough and waves her hand in Niall's face.

"Eight sugars?" Liam asks, taking a sip and raising a dubious eyebrow.

"Six, _god_ , let's just get it down to five," Louis says, looking offended on tea's behalf. Liam ignores her, taking a sip of her tea and making a face. Louis' determined to wean Liam off sugar in her tea and it's not going very well.

"Is that a new," Liam says, changing the subject, looking at Niall's scarf and then at Zayn. Liam tries not to smile at the murderous look on her face and says, "purchase?"

"This?" Niall asks candidly, holding up the hideously coloured swirly knit scarf wrapped around his neck. There's a pom pom on one end, right in the corner and bits of orange that makes Liam wonder if it's cat vomit or just the Nickelback of wool. "Nah, Mattie gave it to me."

"Mattie?" Liam asks lightly, sharing a look with Louis.

"The postman," Zayn cuts in with a meaningful look, tapping Liam's hand so she'd start rubbing at her moustache again.

"Postman Matt, pity it's not Pat," Niall says, twirling the pompoms around. He lifts his sunglasses onto his head to scrutinize it better.

"It's very nice," Louis says in her best shit-eating tone, perching herself on the arm of the sofa and leaning over to pluck at it.

"It bloody is _not_ , I let you bring it into the house! Why do you have to wear it out in public?" Zayn complains, trying to punch Niall in the knee, missing completely since her face is turned the other way, held in Liam's hands.

"He made it for me," Niall says as if it was easy as that, "he's been learning how to knit."

Liam thinks Niall could probably make friends with a lawn mower, given the right time and place.

Zayn mumbles something threateningly under her breathe but it's not like everyone in the room isn't privy to the fact she's not being all that serious. To some extent at least, even Liam has to admit that the thing maybe should not be seen in public as an item of clothing _ever_.

"Aw, but you love me anyway," Niall says, unwrapping the scarf and twirling it around like a lasso. He swings it over Zayn's neck, grabbing onto the other end as it returns to him and pulling her in towards him. Liam lets go of her face and sits back on her heels, looking at the two of them in mock-disgust.

Zayn falls into his lap with no resistance, her arms going around his neck, her hand already toying with the scruffy hair at the back of his head. And then it's like they forget Liam and Louis are in the room because they start _murmuring_ quietly against each other, stealing quick kisses as if they won't be able to tell. Liam thinks she hears something akin to, "Yes, I do," and mimes vomiting to Louis.

Even when Liam was with Andy, she's never felt the need.

The look on Louis' face is similar to what Liam must be pulling. She moves quietly, but Niall and Zayn are otherwise occupied to notice anyway, and creeps right up behind them. She grabs the ends of the scarf and ties it around the both of them, shooting Liam a quick wink before tugging hard and binding the both of them together. They go face-first into each other, smushing noses and lips and cheeks.

"Louis!" Zayn says, trying to claw at Louis but gets distracted soon enough when Niall pulls back the tiniest bit only to start kissing the side of her face, moustache, monobrow and all.

Louis gives up, letting go of the scarf and reaching for her tea again. They untangle themselves and finally separate, Zayn scooting back over to Liam's side so she can start swiping at her face again. Niall toes off his slippers, resting his head against Louis' side and tucking his cold toes underneath Zayn's thighs.

"Get _fucked_ ," Zayn says, pinching his shin, jumping when his cold toes start to wriggle. Niall giggles and Zayn smiles fondly and neither of them move.

Liam concentrates on getting the moustache off Zayn's face.

~

Louis almost drops her keys, shimmying the door open with just her shoulders. Her hands' are full, she got dinner for Liam and herself and there's a bottle of tequila in her other hand. She manages to keep her tight grip on her keys, remembering this time to drop it into the keybowl Liam placed on top of the shoe bench. Louis' somehow started to remember dropping her keys in there, even when she's dead tired and about to flop onto the sofa without taking her uniform off.

"I bought us dinner _and_ tequila," Louis shouts out, forgoing her usual _honey, I'm home_ routine. "The least you can do is help me carry it in!"

Louis pauses in the hallway to sniff around. Liam might've already had dinner but by the smell of things, she's guessing not. She might not even like Chinese food, she's into all that healthy protein shit, but Louis dismisses those thoughts immediately. Nobody doesn't _not_ like Chinese food, and Louis's not seriously _worrying_ Liam's not going to eat with her because that would be ridiculous.

She doesn't care, Louis doesn't care if Liam's going to eat dinner with her or not - she's not in college any more. Louis grits her teeth in determination and marches into the living room, coming to the conclusion Liam doesn't want dinner because she's not helping out in anyway. Okay, so, maybe Louis cares a little bit, it's the bit where she can't explain why, even to herself, that's getting her so worked up and frustrated.

At Liam's silence, Louis considers just shuffling right on to her room and eating everything by herself. She won't even need shot glasses. Or she could call Harry over, he hasn't been by in a little while but he'd definitely be up for some tequila and Chinese food. She shakes her head at herself, she knows he's been busy working with Caroline, taking photos for her fashion shoots and she'd rather just ... _not_.

But when Louis enters the living room, about to jump into the sofa and watch reality TV shows and eat three servings of Chinese food all by herself, she sees Liam curled up on the sofa. Her laptop is in front of her and her eyes are bloodshoot and swollen, clutching a tissue paper in her hand. She doesn't bother hiding her face when she catches sight of Louis, not like last time. She wipes at her face with the tissue and hiccups.

"Hey, what's wrong?" Louis asks, dropping the food onto the coffee table. She places the tequila more carefully next to it, they might most definitely need it.

Liam lifts the laptop off herself, placing it on the coffee table too. She leans back onto the sofa, tugging the sofa throw around her shoulders more tighter. She looks like she's trying to reply but she can't seem to open her mouth and it's so _terrible_ , seeing Liam so obviously upset, to the point she's not even trying to hide it - even in front of Louis who she seems to want to hide everything from.

"He proposed to _her_ , they're going to get married," Liam says, manages to say almost all the words properly but ends up pretty much _wailing_ married, pulling a ridiculously tragic face.

"Oh, babe," Louis says, forgetting about dinner and whether Liam liked Chinese food or not or whatever the fuck it was.

She drops onto the sofa, climbing into Liam's lap to wrap her arms around her neck. She hugs her close, her fingers stroking soothingly at her hair. "C'mere, love," she says and Liam submits easily, sobbing into the side of her neck. She curls her arms tight around Louis' small waist, the sounds of her crying quieter now so she can make out the soft, hush noises Louis' making.

"They're going to have _my_ wedding," Liam says, "in _my_ hometown, in _my_ church."

Louis keeps petting at her hair, her legs splayed across Liam's lap, curling the both of them together while Liam cries for a bit more. It's what she wanted to do since that time in Liam's old bedroom, just comfort her for a little while. Louis glances at Liam's laptop and sees the pictures of the engagement party up on Facebook. He's hugging her like he hugged Liam, smiling at her in the same way, a new ring on a new fiancée. Louis drops a kiss to the top of Liam's head, waiting patiently for Liam's hands to stop clenching at the back of her shirt and her breathing to calm down.

"I've got Chinese food and a bottle of tequila, I'm afraid it's the best I can do," Louis says once Liam's stopped crying, her face still mashed against her, hiccups escaping every now and then against her collarbone.

"I'm sorry," Liam says snottily. "My legs are dead but you're being so lovely and there's snot all over your shirt." Her breath hitches and Louis tries her best not to just squeeze her head in her arms until it pops off and her heart will stop squeezing like that. "You don't have to do this."

"Nonsense," Louis says, letting go of Liam. She reaches down to push her frizzled up hair out of her red, shiny face and smiles helplessly.

Liam sniffles, she looks all ridiculous and wet and she seems to know it, a tiny answering smile appearing even in the midst of her frown. Louis giggles a bit, wipes at her tears with her jumper pulled over her thumb. Liam's smile widens, as if she can't help it either, and it surprises the both of them, the way her cheeks pull and dimple and she starts to laugh too. And that sets Louis off again and they're both curled up, laughing so hard Louis has to slip off her lap and lean against the sofa for support. Liam's pushes her face against Louis' shoulder straight away, not separating for a second, her own shoulders shaking silently.

"I'm being stupid," Liam finally says, reaching forward to grab a tissue and blowing her nose loudly. "I didn't want him anyway. I didn't."

Louis remains glued to the sofa, just reaches out with an arm and runs her thumb over the heated skin around her nose and eyes. When she gets to the end of her nose, she flicks the red tip with her index finger. Liam responds by wrinkling her nose and she's still all red and puffy and sad but completely adorable and Louis tries to sink further into the sofa.

"Thanks, you didn't have to be so nice," Liam says, embarrassed now from her earlier crying.

"I'm not a _complete_ monster, Liam," Louis says, pulling her hand away and clasping them together in her lap so she won't touch again.

"Can we drink some of the tequila, you think?" Liam asks quietly, almost as if she's a child asking for a biscuit.

"You can have all the tequila you want, darling," Louis says, tugging at her jumper because, yeah, it's pretty fucking gross at this point. No matter how cute Liam might be, she has someone else's _snot_ all over herself. She pulls it over her head and attempts to throw it into the corner but Liam intercepts, catching it in her hands. She usually just shoves Louis' dirty clothes left in the bathroom and kitchen and living room back into Louis' room but she doesn't this time.

"I'll wash this," she says, and disappears into her own room to dump it into her laundry bag.

Louis stands there in her uniform and reaches for the tequila. She unscrews the cap open and takes a swig straight from the bottle.

They don't end up drinking all that much, neither of them have enough to have to vomit or pass out. They eat more than they drink and watch the telly and Liam throws caution to the wind and curls up on the sofa, taking over what would usually be Louis' role. Louis' slumped back enough for Liam to comfortably rest her cheek against her belly, her long legs stretching out onto the sofa instead of curling into a ball like Louis does.

"Why do you think he doesn't want me?" Liam asks quietly, absently, as if she's drifting away from herself. She raises her hand in the air, looking at the enagement ring in contemplation. She doesn't sound upset, rather, she sounds like she's finished crying for a while.

"Because he's a fucking idiot," Louis says fiercely. She could have said people fell out of love all the time, some people didn't even realise a love like that could exist until someoe else came along, somehow one day somebody could wake up and realise their heart was empty of that love and so it goes.

"We're a sorry kind of pair," Liam says, snorting morosely. She looks at her ring for another second before reaching up with her other hand, twisting the ring around three times. "I could never imagine our life after the wedding. It was like, I knew the table arrangements and the flowers I wanted and picture Andy in his stupid shorts on the beach for the honeymoon but I couldn't even begin to think about our lives when we'd be old."

Liam twists the ring one final time and glances up at Louis almost as if she's asking if she should do it. Louis doesn't know what to say to that, she makes it a habit not to think of happily ever afters - there's no disappointments if there's no expectations - so she just nods. Liam's eyes flit back to her hand and she pulls the ring off, holding it between her thumb and index finger for a moment before resting it right at the corner of the coffee table.

When Louis wakes up in the morning, wrapped up thoroughly in extra blankets that smell like their shared detergent but an underlying sense of _Liam_ , she's alone and the ring's been swept away along with the shot glasses and take out cartons.

~

Liam's having her lunch in the staff room, forking bits of leafy greens and popping it into her mouth, scrolling through her phone absently when she gets the call. She doesn't realise who it is for a second, tilts her head to the side and tries to remember why his voice sounds so familiar until it finally clicks, _childhood friend Stan_. It doesn't take her long to grab her coat and run out, stumbling down the stairs in her stupid work heels instead of taking the elevator, unable to run freely because she's wearing a skirt today and it's constricting her movement.

Because Louis' hurt and Stan has no way to get to the diner at the moment without leaving a room full of preschoolers and Liam doesn't have to think twice about running. Louis still called Stan over Liam who's only _five_ minutes away.

Liam doesn't bother waiting for the bus, she could probably get there quicker if she legged it all the way. She crashes into a tall business man who's obviously seen her running down the pavement and refused to move out of the way in the first place. She ignores how the hot coffee starts to spread and doesn't bother telling him to go _fuck himself_ because she's so close. She gets to the diner out of breathe, her hair all messed up, her poor feet all blistered.

"Liam?" Louis asks in surprise. She doesn't look like she's been grievously injured at all. She's sitting at the counter, her jacket thrown over her waitress uniform. She has her arm cradled protectively inside the jacket, protected against her chest and she looks dumbfounded to see Liam here. "What are you doing here?"

"Taking you to the hospital," Liam wheezes out, stomping over to where she's sitting. She shrugs out of her coat, feels the temperature rising in her body even more now that she's stopped running. Liam reaches for her arm, trying to see how hurt Louis actually is but she shies away like a wounded animal.

"How'd you know I hurt my wrist?" Louis asks, frowning on confusion.

"Stan called," Liam says as patiently as she can because Louis is hurt and she doesn't know why she feels so _mad_ but she's not mad at Louis and there's no reason to take it out on her. It just, Louis _hurt_ sparks anger in her skin and it's unreasonable for all the reasons Liam can't bear to think about right now.

"Why does Stan have your number?" Louis asks suspiciously, narrowing her eyes as if she thinks Stan and Liam are planning to mutiny her as the captain or something. She shrugs, wincing when she jostles her arm accidentally and says, "Aren't you supposed to be at work? You should probably go back, you could get fired and it's like, a proper job now, yeah? I can just catch the bus."

Louis starts to get up, reaching for her bag on the counter.

"Louis," Liam says and there must be something obvious in her face that Liam can't control because Louis stills unnaturally. She never does anything she's told and it drives Liam crazy but just this _once_ Louis needs to be taken care of. Louis stays just like that even when Liam reaches for her swollen wrist, gentle as she can possibly move.

"I don't think it's broken or anything, I wasn't paying attention and closed the huge metal fridge door on it by accident because I'm a fucking idiot," Louis says, teasing, self-deprecating. She's as confused as Liam is about the way she's acting but she's still trying to lift her mood, to cheer her up, as if it's Liam who needs comforting in this situation.

"C'mon, let's go," Liam says softly. She lets go of her hand, breathes out a sigh of relief because it's not like Louis' _dying_ and her heart's stopped beating like it was trying to burst out of her chest. Louis tucks her arm back against herself and Liam wraps her jacket around her more tightly, careful not bump her sore wrist. She takes her own coat and wraps it around Louis to, ignoring her amused raise of an eyebrow.

"You must think I'm dumb as paint," Louis says with a snort, being led out by Liam. She waves goodbye at her co-workers as the glass door swings shut behind her.

"It was just an accident," Liam says, taking a deep breath, "and dumb as paint isn't a saying or, y'know, _anything."_

"Aw, there's the Liam we all know and love," Louis says, bumping into her side with an attempted hip check. She groans when her hurt wrist is moved about.

"Careful!" Liam says, her voice rising in panic. She grabs her unhurt hand while she hails a taxi and holds it all the way to the hospital.

The whole fiasco ends up with Louis' wrist ending up being broken in _two_ different places. Liam has a pretty high pain tolerance herself and she still doesn't understand how Louis wasn't crying. She doesn't understand how she was trying to make Liam feel better about the whole thing. She gets a bright blue cast and a particularly spectacular high on painkillers.

"Thanks for picking us up," Liam says, following after Louis into the backseat of the car. Louis slumps into her lap straight away, giggling at the material of her skirt.

"Why didn't she call _me_?" Harry asks, confused, tapping his finger against the steering wheel. He's frowning, biting down on his bottom lip and Caroline has to nudge him to alert him to the light change.

"Maybe she knew you were busy," Caroline says, keeping her hand on Harry's arm. "It's okay, Liam was there."

Harry still looks confused and a bit miffed, upset mostly because he wasn't there for Louis. It doesn't seem to last long and he grins helplessly when Louis surges forward, laughing and tickling his ears from the backseat. Liam hauls her back into the seat besides her with an arm around her waist, mindful of the cast and Louis slumps back against her, nosing against Liam's jawline instead and making a content noise.

"You're all my favourites," Louis says happily, trying to clap her hands together. Liam holds her uninjured hand so she doesn't do any more damage to her broken wrist. When she glances up, Caroline is twisted around in her seat, watching the both of them with a smile.

"I don't think she knows what she's saying," Liam says grimly, unable to smile back because there's no way Liam's anywhere near one of Louis' favourite people.

When they get to the flat, Harry carries Louis up the stairs. Louis can walk but she doesn't want to and Harry seems to feel guilty as all fuck because he lets her boss him around even more than usual. Liam trails along after them, worrying unreasonably because there's no way Harry would drop Louis but _still_.

As soon as they get through the door, Caroline makes her way to the kitchen. She stops after a couple of steps, looking around her in amazement at how different Louis' flat looks. There's the rug and the coffee table and the fresh flowers in the vase and only two cans of beer on top of the TV unit. Caroline keeps looking around her as she makes her way to the kitchen, clearly knowing the way even with all the change. Harry sets Louis on the sofa and settles down next to her, hugging her close.

"Don't draw any dicks on her cast," Liam says in warning, taking off her shoes and closing her eyes in bliss as her blistered toes find flat ground. "I took her to the hospital, it's my right," Liam says, poking Harry in the rib because he still looks stricken.

His eyes kind of light up in delight anyway at the idea of Liam drawing a dick on Louis' cast and Liam ignores the pleased warmth spreading in her belly because Harry has that affect on people and she refuses to be affected. Louis struggles upright, walking over to Liam and throwing her arms around her.

"Do you have anything to make soup?" Harry asks, watching the both of them with a look of concentration that's a bit unnerving.

"Nope," Liam says, a bit grim, trying to hold Louis up since she's decided her legs aren't good enough. She runs her fingertips down Liam's face and then against the seam of her mouth.

"I'll go out and get some stuff to make her chicken soup," Harry says, getting right back up again. He grabs his keys and shoves them into his back pocket, with a fair amount of difficulty, and kisses Louis' cheek. "You'll take care of her, yeah?"

"Of course," Liam says, feels like it's the most obvious thing in the world. He goes off into the kitchen, probably to get Caroline and Liam belatedly yells out a, "Thanks, Harry!"

Liam looks back down at Louis who's closed her eyes, leaning against Liam as if she's about to fall asleep right there and then. For such a tiny girl, Louis weighs a fucking tonne. She starts to make her way, painstakingly slow, to Louis' room, half-dragging half-carrying her along with her.

"C'rline?" Louis mumbles against Liam's neck, finally cooperating and finally starting to move her legs.

Liam shakes her head, feels her throat close up so she can't say _no, just me_. They make it in one piece to the bedroom but when Liam tries to deposit her onto her bed, Louis holds on with all her strength, her arms tight around Liam's neck.

"Thank youuuuu," Louis says, kissing the last vowel into the sides of her cheek sloppily, her eyes mostly shut.

Liam stays very still, leaning over Louis' form, unable to move any closer or farther away because Louis thinks she's Caroline. Louis thinks she's Caroline and Liam knows it's terrible but it's so _nice_ to think of a universe where Louis loved _her_.

"I like your face," Louis says, smiling, opening her eyes only to blink sleepily slow. "And your lower lip and your legs and your eyebrows."

She hits herself in the face with her cast when she tries to get both hands up. She pulls a face and Liam can't stop smiling at her, to pretend for another second. She draws her index fingers up against her own eyebrows, aligning them properly this time, and wriggles them like caterpillars. Louis laughs, her eyes crinkling in the corners and her mouth stretching into a pretty smile, showing off her pointy canines.

"And your pancake bummy bum bum," Louis says, and with that she lets go of Liam and slumps back onto the bed, the meds finally knocking her out.

Liam stands there for another moment, one knee resting against her mattress, just seeing how her straight eyelashes fan out against her sharp cheekbones, smudged with eyeliner and mascara and wearing as the day ages. She reaches down to pull a strand of hair from between Louis' mouth, her fingertips lingering on the softness of Louis' cheeks. She pulls the blankets over Louis and takes a step back, turning around and heading back out. She closes the door very softly behind her. She's tired, she's had a very tiring day and she just wants to change into her pyjamas and go to sleep.

"It's nice to see, somebody loving Louis as much as she deserves," Caroline says, standing at the other end of the hallway.

Liam's head snaps up, unable to take another step forward, her hand still holding onto the doorknob. "What?" she asks, cauht off-guard. "I'm still in love with Andy," she says belatedly, still going through this momentary shock, as if she's just reminded herself of something old and forgotten, not so much as buried but faded.

"Okay," Caroline says, a small knowing smile stretching her lips. It unnerves Liam even if Caroline couldn't have been aiming to make her uncomfortable.

"I thought you went shopping with Haz," Liam says, finally detaching herself from Louis' bedroom door and walking forward, out of the darkened hallway where she won't have to feel like she's hiding something that she oughtn't be.

"He's a big boy, he can handle himself," Caroline says with an easy laugh, following after her. "She deserves the best."

"She always did," Liam says with an air of finality.

She thinks about just going off to her room like she originally planned to, crawl into bed and put off calling work till the morning. But Caroline made tea and she's doing _her_ best and the least Liam can do is stay. She sits down in the living room, reaching for her tea and making a sound of surprise at how it's just right.

"Louis left instructions with a marker on the fridge," Caroline says, sipping at her own.

Liam remembers Louis writing them out one night, shaking her head in disappointment as she scribbled in the 8. They managed to get it down to 6 sugars but Liam erased it with her fingertip and rewrote 8. It's for when Louis' sleep stupid in the morning and unable to remember how to use the kettle. This way, she doesn't forget how they both like their tea.

They wait for Harry to get back and it's not uncomfortable but it's quiet in a way Liam hasn't been used to since living with Louis. Liam turns the telly on and curls up on the sofa, on her side and drinks her tea, can see from here all the ways Louis might've fallen in love with _her_.

Harry finally stumbles back into the flat, both of his massive hands loaded with plastic bags. His curls are drenched, clinging to his forehead and falling into his eyes. He takes a huge gasping breathe, trying to blink the water out of his eyes and says, "It's raining outside."

"What took you so long? Did you go to a chicken farm, kill the chicken and pluck out its feathers yourself?" Caroline asks, obviously teasing, raising an eyebow.

"Heyyyy," Harry says defensively but he's grinning at her, dimpling from the force of it. "I just like fresh poultry."

"Alright, love, let's get you dry then," Caroline says with a warm laugh, getting off the sofa and walking over to him. She runs her hand through his sodden curls, laughing at the state of him.

Harry shakes his head immediately, like he's a puppy drying off, and manages to get rain water all over her face. She smack him in the chest with the back of her hand, still laughing like she can't help it, unbearably fond.

Liam helps Harry carry the rest of the ingredients into the kitchen and leaves the both of them to get Harry warm and dry. Harry's bought enough food to last them a week without having to go grocery shopping.

~

There's chicken soup for Louis when she wakes up and more of her medicine and the doctor's orders Liam's pretty much memorised at this point. The flat is silent now except for the rain pelting down outside, flashes of lightning followed by thunder. It illuminates Liam's duvet every now and then and she's all nice and warm under the covers but she still can't seem to falls asleep.

She ends up padding along the narrow hallway in her Captain America slippers. She left Louis' bedroom slightly ajar just in case Louis called out in the middle of the night for something. Liam slips inside quietly, shivering in her pyjamas, her toes curled in her slippers. Louis' still in a deep sleep, curled up on her side like she always does, her nose buried against her pillow. Liam doesn't understand how she sleeps so comfortably like that, Liam feels like she's suffocating if there's anything right up against her nose. Louis doesn't seem to mind, it's like the opposite, she needs to keep her nose warm by snuffling it against Liam's thigh or into her pillow.

"Lou?" Liam tries, whispering. She rubs at her arms as another clap of thunder rolls past.

Louis doesn't reply but Liam wasn't really expecting her to. She stumbles forward, resting her knee on the edge of the mattress. She slips inside the duvet besides her and wriggles into place, careful not to jostle Louis' cast. Her hair is spread all over her pillow and there's the smell of her preferred shampoo, the one that always leaves her smelling like milk and honey. Liam breathes in, her chest hitching once, but keeps her distance. She reaches out with her index finger, resting against the back of her neck, Louis' curled away from her. She traces the bony ridge at the top of her spine, her shirt slipping down to show her skin, almost frighteningly pale in the light of the periodic lightning, fragile, unlike how it is in daylight.

Liam doesn't know what she would've done if Louis was gravely injured. She doesn't want to think about it, it makes her chest constrict and it gets too scary. Louis is loud, unapologetic, this undefeatable _force_ \- she doesn't want to imagine her broken up on a hospital bed. Liam leans forward and brushes her lips against the soft skin just above the collar of her shirt and fall asleep.

~

Liam wakes up with Louis' nose shoved against the hollow of her throat, her hair tickling Liam's neck.

"Morning," Louis mouths against her shirt, making a humming noise of content.

"Hi," Liam says softly, her arm coming up naturally around Louis' shoulder. She palms the tangled mess at the back of her head, stroking her fingers through it, her fingertips brushing over the shell of her ear over and over again.

There's joy filling her chest, running down to her toes and her fingertips and Liam feels _happy_ to just be here, at this moment, with a safe and sleepy Louis in her arms. She runs the pad of her thumb against her tattoo of a stag, her skin soft and sleep-warm, and closes her eyes.

~

Sometimes, it's like this feeling of pure _want_ overwhelms Liam. And it's terrifying, her head hits the pillow and all she can think of what it'd be like to push Louis up against the counter on their slow mornings and kiss her. She can't think of anything that might be as satisfying than that one thing. Liam has to pause while she's applying body lotion, her mind flitting back to how different it'd be to feel her Louis' skin underneath her fingertips, not the casual everyday touches but to rest her palms against the curve of her waist, slotting their bare legs together and how her slightly chapped lips will feel.

And other times, it's not anything like that all. When Louis' leaning against the same counter, her eyes closed against the sunlight streaming through the window, her hair framing her lit face, Liam just wants to push her hair back off her face, kiss her sun-warmed cheeks. Right where her eyes crinkle up when she smiles. Pull her into the living room and onto the sofa, tangled together, completely wrapped up around each other and just _stay_.

Liam can say she's never felt like this before, not with Andy, not with _anyone_. And that's another thing, she doesn't know when but she's stopped comparing everything to Andy, Louis to him - she's become the exception to everything Liam thought she'd ever need.

When Liam rummages through her bedside table for a missing earring piece, she stumbles across her engagement ring and has to pause. She was going to get _married_ , to spend the rest of her life with someone else and it hurts to think of the universes where she barely brushes past Louis or not know her at all as much as it would make it easier.

~

What Louis hadn't been anticipating was just how much having a cast would fucking _suck_. Firstly, masturbating with her left hand takes longer than usual and she gets tired and sleepy or she's already running late for work and doesn't have the time to finish. It's infuriating, is what it is. And furthermore, it's like she can't even do simple tasks like have a comfortable shower without worrying about water getting into her cast or shampooing her hair one-handed or even just _brush her hair_. She's taken to staring at her left hand in wonder. It's terrible how she's just gone through life having one hand that seems to be shit at _everything_.

Now that she can't brush her hair, it's all she can ever think about, like how unruly her hair must be at the back where she can't reach. When Niall reminds her that she sometimes teases her hair to make it messier on nights she goes out with him, she tries to break his collarbone with her cast.

Having a cast fucking sucks and she will not stand for reasonable reminders while she's in the cast.

Louis screams in frustration but her mouth fills with water from the shower head and she ends up gargling it instead. She coughs it up, wiping at her eyes with her good hand and glares down at the useless cast in the plastic bag, strapped just above the cast. She's supposed to be getting ready for the night shift at the diner and she's put off washing her hair for too long to risk it tonight. She's got a broken wrist but both her legs are still working as she's sure as hell not going to fall behind on rent and have to _owe_ money to anyone.

She hears a hurried knocking on the bathroom door over her cursing. Louis forgot Liam was home.

"You alright?" Liam asks, her voice muffled through the thickness of the bathroom door.

"Fucking fine and _dandy_!" Louis says, can't keep the sarcastic bite out of her voice because it's only been a week but she's so sick of this cast. She never thought of how helpful having both hands were until she couldn't use them anymore.

Louis sighs out loud, resting her forehead against the cool tiles across from her. "I'm - _no_ \- I can't get at the conditioner," Louis finally says.

There's a moment of silence, half a beat really, before Liam interjects with, "Do you need help?"

Louis lifts her head off the tile, tilting her face towards the shower. The fast-cooling water runs over her face and she opens her mouth, gathering water into her mouth and thinks _yes I really fucking do_. She wishes Harry was here, it wouldn't be awkward at all if he came over to help her with the shower. They've showered enough times together to have everything down pat, timing the usage of shampoo and conditioner down to a fine art. Louis shoots out a stream of water through her pursed lips and rubs tiredly at her eyes.

"Yeah, okay, the door's open," Louis says, her back to the door. "Why doesn't this conditioner come with a fucking pump?"

"Dunno," Liam says, closing the door behind her with a quiet click.

Louis keeps her back to Liam, hunched over herself. It's not like - Liam's seen her tits before, Louis still walks around naked all the time. She just doesn't want to face Liam right now, that's all, she feels vulnerable and useless and she just needs to chuck some conditioner in her hair so she won't be working at the diner with her face barely discernible between the frizz.

The glass door of the shower slides open and Louis shivers at the sudden gust of air. She stays under the stream of water but goosebumps still break out along her slick skin.

"Did they call you in for work tonight?" Liam asks calmly, as if this is an everyday occurrence. If anybody had told Louis that Liam would be helping her shower when she first moved it, she'd have laughed till she was on the ground.

"Yeah," Louis mumbles, letting Liam tug her out of the direct splash of water.

She can hear Liam squeezing the conditioner out onto the palm of her head, reaching forward to start running it gently through the strands of Louis' hair. Louis sighs out loud, pleased. Louis doesn't even find hair stroking to have much of a soothing effect, her scalp feels hypersensitive and every tug tickles and irritates than anything else. But it's different with Liam, it's probably her smooth, long fingers.

"You should ask, y'know, if you need help with anything," Liam says quietly, her knuckles brushing against the wet skin of Louis' shoulder blades. "Is this too much conditioner?"

"Nah, that's fine," Louis says, pulling away so Liam won't feel the shudder pass down her spine. "Thanks," Louis says, turning around, reaching to slide the door shut.

Liam's rolled her sleeves up but there's still water running down her forearm and into the material, the rest of her bone dry. Liam's eyes stay on her face for another second before she nods and turns around, heading out. Louis gets underneath the spray of water again and closes her eyes, too chicken shit to turn the water any colder.

~

Louis has come to the conclusion that the only reason she can't stop _staring_ at Liam, the dip at the centre of her bottom lip and the way the wispy hairs at the base of her neck curls after she's come in after a run, is because she hasn't gotten _laid_ in so long. She's just been a bit busy, that's all, working and sleeping and dealing with her broken wrist. It's got nothing to do with the amount of time she spends with Liam, at home watching a movie or going to the markets on Sunday mornings to buy their toilet paper in bulk from the old Asian couple or painting each other's nails and falling asleep against each other, sheet marks pressed into the colour every time.

She's been _busy_. It's not like Louis only works every shift she can get at the diner, she works odd cleaning jobs as well and goes along with Josh whenever he needs an extra man on the job for whatever job he's got going on at the moment. Plus, she's visited her family and spent a weekend at home lounging around in her pyjamas and hanging out with Stan and looking after the boys while her mum finally has some free time to do gross stuff with her step-dad. Not to mention she's been helping out Zayn for her next gallery showing thing and it's like - she's been doing a lot of stuff, it's not justthe fact she has Liam that's been keeping her.

Besides, between all of that, she hasn't had all that much time to throw on a dress and go out with the sole purpose of getting some. She's just fucking horny and Liam's always around in her sexy work clothes and sometimes she kind of curls up on herself when she laughs too hard and snorts a bit and it's only _human_ to want to snog the sense out of her and sneak a hand under that skirt. But Louis' figured out how to fix it, she just needs to get laid and then she'll be able to, like, stop _objectifying_ Liam in her head because they're friends now and she feels guilty about it.

The first step to getting all this shit resolved is to shave her legs. It's proving quite difficult since her left hand is fucking useless. Louis sits at the edge of the tub, gritting her teeth in frustration as she tries to shave in a straight line. She's already nicked her right knee and just dabbed a bit of toilet paper over the little bleeding cut. She's not planning to go out covered in blood so she decides to forgo shaving her knees - everyone can fucking suck it. She chucks her razor across to the other side of the bathtub, glaring at the useless thing as if it's entirely to blame.

"Hey, Lou, do you know if we've got any papri-," Louis stumbles to a stop in the doorway, not even having to nudge the door open since Louis left it wide open.

"We used it all on the chicken, I think, last Monday?" Louis says, glancing up at her from her position on the edge of the bathtub. She's only dressed in her t-shirt and panties and the conditioner she's been using to shave have left her legs all shiny. The corner of Liam's mouth quirks up.

"Are you going out tonight?" Liam asks, leaning against the doorway, tilting her head to the side to get a look at the abandoned razor lying sadly on its side.

"Yeah, if I can shave my bloody legs," Louis says angrily, blowing a piece of hair out of her eyes. She could probably just go out like this, there's still a high chance she'd pull.

"Here, then, let me," Liam says, entering the bathroom.

She's in one of Louis' jumpers (that's actually Niall's), the one she cried all over, and oversized trackpants with her hair thrown up in a raggedy bun but she still manages to look severely disapproving. She climbs into the dry bathtub, sitting herself down in front of Louis and inspecting the cut with a little frown. She reaches for the razor on the other side of the bathtub and rinses it in the cup of warm water Louis' left besides her hip, her knuckles nudging against the bare skin of her thigh.

"You're already bleeding," Liam says, peeling the toilet paper off to assess the damage, drawing her foot into her lap.

"You try shaving with your left hand," Louis says, crossing her arms.

"Not if you want to keep both legs," Liam says, flashing a quick grin her way. She stares around herself for a bit before her eyebrows furrow in confusion and she says, "Lou, why are you shaving your legs with conditioner?"

" _Trust_ me, it works better than anything," Louis says, tossing her the tube. There's a whole story about how Stan tried it out first when he tried shaving his balls but she doesn't think Liam needs to know all the details.

Liam still looks dubious but she does as she's told. She squirts the conditioner into the palm of her head and spreads it down along her shin, careful to get it even. Louis wriggles her toes, tries to pinch the inside of Liam's thighs through the material of her track pants to be a dick. Liam squirms away with a laugh and it's infuriating how Liam laughs at the stupidest things Louis does and how that leads to her wanting to do more and _more_ stupid things. Liam starts shaving her leg, starting just below her knee. She slides the razor up her shin in easy, long strokes with steady hands, rinsing off the build-up in the cup every now and then. Liam's extra careful around the bony triangle of her knee, her tongue poked into the corner of her mouth, her eyebrows serious.

Louis' insides squeeze tight and she can't help smiling fondly, lightly flicking at the crease between her eyebrows. Liam ignores her, concentrating on her other shin and working with the same amount of determination and concentration she usually reserves for important tasks. Like hoovering the whole flat up and down every Sunday morning.

"You going to come out with us tonight?" Louis asks. Liam tugs at her leg until Louis is pulled forward against the edge of the bathtub, giving her access to shave higher.

"Didn't know I was invited," Liam says candidly, rubbing her palms against Louis' thigh, getting them slicked up with conditioner.

So maybe Louis' plan of resolving sexual frustration by going out tonight would've worked much better if the object of her sexual frustration wasn't running her fingers up and down her _thigh_ beforehand. Louis swallows hard, tries her best not to let her legs just fall open as much as she'd like to.

"Of course you are," Louis says, her voice sounding off to even her ears. She clears her throat, tries to get her heated pulse to just _cease_ all together and focuses on the feel of the razor against her leg instead of how Liam's fingers are digging into her skin.

"Alright," Liam says agreeably, looking up from between Louis' legs to smile at her.

Louis pulls her leg out of Liam's grip, getting off the edge of the bathtub to reach for her towel. She wipes the conditioner off hurriedly. She doesn't need to have both legs shaved, that's ridiculous. All she needs to do now is to get dressed and put her make-up on and mostly get out of the bathroom before she stays a second longer.

"You're not done!" Liam complains, plonking the razor in the cup in confusion.

"Believe me, I am," Louis says and runs out of the bathroom as fast as she can, flustered. She closes her door behind her with a slam and leans against it for barely a second before she launches herself off of it, about to comb her wardrobe for something to wear. Somethingthat's guaranteed to get her laid tonight.

~

Leigh-Anne's fucking ace. They've been friends for longer they've been fucking on an on and off basis so it's like they're always on the same wavelength. They both know what they want and she doesn't expect anything more or less than what Louis would of her. It's easy, practised and really fucking _fun_.

Her hair feels slightly stiff against Louis' fingers and she can smell the hairspray she's taken the extra effort of spraying into it tonight. Nothing matters, really, when her body's _hot_ up against Louis, pressing her insistently against the wall until Louis' forgotten about the music blaring around them entirely, only focused on the soft noise she makes against Louis' jaw as her hand slides down between her legs. Usually, Leigh-Anne would be complaining about how she has _standards_ and how she needs a queen sized bed at the very least but Louis knows exactly what to do to get her desperate and rocking against the heel of her palm. Louis feels a sharp nip against her bottom lip, bordering on being too painful, followed by a twist of her nipple, Leigh-Anne's hand somehow already under her shirt. She gasps out loud, trying to ride her thigh and it makes Leigh-Anne laugh smugly.

This is exactly what she needed, gorgeous, fantastic Leigh-Anne with her clever fingers. Leigh-Anne mouths along the side of her neck, overheated and sweating by now, and blows cool air against the feverish skin to feel Louis shiver against her. Leigh-Anne likes harping on about hotel rooms and champagne but Louis knows she likes best when it's a little bit messy, up against each other in a loud club. Leigh-Anne reaches down between them, pinching Louis' belly, before she adjusts Louis' clumsy left hand firmer against her clit.

And when Louis closes her eyes, losing herself in it, she can imagine what it would feel like to have Liam's steady fingers curled around her wrist, guiding her along. If she'd be as bossy as Leigh-Anne, sure in what she wants, or eager to learn, how her lips would feel against her cunt, how her skin would taste - Louis' eyes slam open. The sounds of the club come rushing back in, over Leigh-Anne's laughter and the blood pounding in her ears and Louis knows, deep down in her gut, that there's something off. She looks over Leigh-Anne's shoulder, eyes searching for a sign of a disturbance and only finds Liam standing at the edge of the crowd. Their eyes meet and she holds it. When Leigh-Anne bites down, Louis' eyes flutter shut. She struggles to open them again and Liam's not there anymore. She's disappeared behind Harry, crowded along by Niall and Zayn into the centre of the dance floor and Louis closes her eyes again, trying desperately to focus on Leigh-Anne again.

"Alright, babe?" Leigh-Anne asks afterwards, leaning in to help Louis fix her hair in the bathroom.

Louis hops up, sitting up on the sink counter. "Huh? Yeah, I'm good," Louis says, still dazed. She catches Leigh-Anne's hand trying to smooth her hair down and tugs her forward for another kiss. "Staying over tonight?"

Leigh-Anne pulls away, shaking her head with a short laugh. "You know I love you but you're way too preoccupied to be of any good use."

" _Oi_ ," Louis says, reaching forward to pinch her nipple through her skin tight dress. "You weren't saying that ten minutes ago," Louis says indignantly. She puts on a shrill voice and says, " _Oh, you make me so hot Louis, you're arse is so fucking fantastic_."

Leigh-Anne almost teeters over in her heels laughing, clutching at Louis' thighs to stay upright. She punches Louis in the shoulder, wiping at the eye liner smudging under her eyes from the force of her laughter. Louis slumps against the mirror and spends the rest of the time watching her put her lip gloss back on.

"Hey, I'll see you later, yeah?" Leigh-Anne asks, leaning in for an air kiss.

Louis follows after her insistently just to be a dick and kisses the corner of her mouth, triumphing against Leigh-Anne's attempts to fend her off. Leigh-Anne makes a face, her lip gloss smearing everywhere. Louis mimics the face, pulling the same one and leans forward to kiss her goodbye properly, tasting the plasticky sweetness against her tongue. Leigh-Anne rolls her eyes, giving up on the lip gloss and Louis blows her a shit-eating kiss on her way out.

Louis rests her weary head against the mirror of the bathroom and concentrates on breathing evenly.

It didn't help in the slightest.

~

There was no discussion about whether Louis or Liam were going to be going to Zayn's art gallery. It's not because Zayn would breathe fire if they didn't (she's really vulnerable when it comes to these things, she doesn't want anyone there that doesn't want to be) but because it's pretty much a given. She's been working tirelessly day and night and it's finally finished and they're looking forward to it more than anything.

It's not like they _decided_ to go together as each other's date or anything, that was a given too.

"Whoa," Louis says, stilling her attempts to shove one of her fancier earrings through her earlobes and get her feet into her heels at the same time. She almost stumbles, her ankle twisting.

Louis lets go of the shoe, resting both feet on the even ground, and has to tilt her head to the side and have a moment to take it in. "Whoa," she reiterates, her eyes finally running up to Liam's face.

"Shut up," Liam says self-consciously, her cheeks tinged with a natural flush.

Liam tugs at the hem of her perfectly tailored shorts, doing nothing to pull them down lower over her long legs. She's finished already, well, on-time, and she looks gorgeous in her blazer, hair in loose curls, her lips even pinker than usual.

"You look _fantastic_ ," Louis says honestly, wincing as she finally pops the earring in. She kicks her shoes out of the way to stalk forward, circling around Liam like she's prey. Liam might steal the whole show and then Louis' going to have to pick up Zayn's pieces after.

"Stop teasing," Liam says, crossing her arms. There's a smile starting to tug at the corners of her lips though, her eyes following Louis around.

"I'm not," Louis insists, unable to keep her eyes off her legs. She runs a casual finger against the outside of her smooth thigh and tries to pinch her higher up, just underneath the shorts.

"It looks okay? Shorts aren't usually my thing," Liam says, leaning over slightly to stare down at her bare legs. She glances back up, quick, and says, "Caroline sent them over as thanks, and these shoes, for the website."

"Well, they should definitely become your thing, babe," Louis says, wriggling her eyebrows, reaching around to smack Liam's arse.

Liam laughs, reaching out to intercept belatedly. She still holds onto her wrist, her fingertips against Louis' pulse point and Louis can't help remembering the other night, Liam's phantom grip in relation to this one. Louis doesn't pull her hand away abruptly but eases it out of her grip, looking up at Liam's feigned height.

"C'mon, we should hurry in case Zayn loses it," Liam says. She bites down on her bottom lip, not making any moves to turn away.

"Yeah, okay, I'm done," Louis says, bending over to retrieve her shoes again. She settles onto the sofa, trying to do the clasp with one hand.

Zayn hugs the both of them on entry, almost toppling all three of them over in her haste. She's a bundle of nerves but she doesn't seem frazzled, she's more excited, in her element, and Niall's right there behind her.

~

Louis might have had a bit too much champagne. She feels dizzy from it but not enough for her to have to throw up. The buzz isn't all that great, she can still feel how her shoes are killing her feet. Still, she's been through the gallery twice now and had three conversations with Zayn in the bathroom about how she was rocking the fucking hell out of this.

She just needs to have a sit down somewhere and possibly take her shoes off. Preferably somewhere private so she won't be embarrassing Zayn in front of all the artsy fartsy people.

Louis' surprised, in a distant sort of way. Caroline's come as Harry's date and she looks beautiful, as always, but it doesn't feel like Louis' hearts going to explode in painfully equal parts joy and hopelessness. It's not like it was sudden either but it catches her off guard anyway. She smiles at the both of them, hugging Harry for twice as long because she's been selfish and unfair about this for so long but she didn't know how else to deal with it.

Louis places her flute of champagne down somewhere and walks out the backdoor. There are four cigarette butts on the last step down and Louis can guess Zayn's already been here. She sits down near the back door, resting her head against the wall of the building to her side. She doesn't know how long she stays there, just sitting by herself, when the door creaks open behind her.

Louis yawns, flattening herself against the wall to let whoever it is pass. The person doesn't though, they pause for a second and then walk down the steps till they're level with Louis and takes a seat next to her. Louis cracks one eye open, tilting her head towards the intruder and lets out a surprised huff of laughter. Liam's face is right in front of hers but she's pulling at her ears, her cheeks full of air, pretty lips pouting.

"Liam Payne the monkey," Louis says, squeezing the air out of her cheeks with her hand.

"What are you doing out here?" Liam asks, pulling Louis' hand away so she can talk. She holds onto it, placing it into her lap and clasping them together.

"A bit tired," Louis says, yawning again. She blinks up sleepily at Liam, guards down, smiling fondly. "She's so bloody talented, I'm real fucking proud."

"Yeah," Liam says with an answering grin, tilting her head towards the door, referring to Zayn. "Alright?" Liam asks, her voice soft.

"I'm alright," Louis says and nods, means it.

Louis doesn't know when Liam's gotten so close. Louis' eyes are automatically drawn to Liam's lips and just how plush they look and the crumb that's left at the corner of her mouth. Louis reaches up to thumb it away, gentle enough not to scare her away. Her eyes flicker up to meet Liam's, warm and serious, and she gets it, she knows what's going to happen, she's done it enough times to recognise the signs by now. Her eyes slide shut right before Liam kisses her.

Liam's hand smooths away the fly away hairs from Louis' face, tucking it behind her ear, her thumb tracing the shell of her ear and resting just underneath, her palm curved against her neck, pulling her in closer. Louis kisses her back, squeezes the hand still in Liam's lap and tries to gain some leverage, her lips parting easily.

"What was that for?" Louis asks when they pull apart. Her eyes are hazy and she's breathing quite hard, feeling a sense loss without Liam warm against her.

Liam opens her mouth to reply to Louis but she never gets to know the answer because she's surging forward again, kissing the words from her lips.

"Should we go home now?" Liam asks quietly, a corner of her mouth lifting. She presses their foreheads together, breathing the same air, her thumb stroking Louis' cheek.

"Uh-huh," Louis says breathlessly, tilting her head to the side to steal one last quick kiss from her swollen pink lips.

~

"Have you ever kissed a girl before?" Louis asks, curious, on the way home. She's linked their pinkies together, swinging their arm back and forth between them.

They've already said their goodbyes to everyone at the gallery and Liam spent the whole time trying to cross her toes in her heels (impossible), flushing at the very thought of everyone realising what was happening. She kept licking at her lips, feeling obvious and hypersensitive and _wanting_. Harry's eyebrows shot up almost as soon as he saw them, his giant mouth opening like he was going to start crowing in pure delight before Caroline pinched the flesh at his hip, just above the waistband of his jeans. Zayn was too distracted by then, on cloud 9, to notice anything and only gave them huge hugs and a kiss before disappearing off into the crowd again.

Liam turns her head to look at Louis, her heart stuttering in her chest at the way her eyelashes fan out against her cheek, staring down at their joined fingers. Louis glances up, catching Liam's eyes as she shakes her head silently, no. Louis' grin turns shark-like, all pointy canines and it makes heat curl between Liam's hips, her cheeks warming.

"Have you ever _thought_ about kissing a girl before, then?" Louis asks coyly, twisting their fingers together so they're holding hands properly. She tugs Liam up the stairs to their building, taking them two at a time.

Liam's pretty sure Louis' getting off on the fact that she's the first girl Liam's ever kissed and she doesn't quite understand how that would be appealing at all. But Louis looks all smug and pleased, as eager as Liam and it only makes her want her more. Liam answers honestly.

"Yeah, this one time I lost the student elections," Liam says loftily, pushing an out of breath Louis up against their door when they reach the landing.

She gets right up close, tilting her head to the side, pressing the length of her body against Louis', slipping her bare thigh between Louis' and grinning in satisfaction at the surprise on Louis' face. Liam makes a face as if she's pondering something, trying to stop herself from kissing Louis for another second when her lips feel like they're drawn to her skin. She grabs her arse instead, sliding her hand underneath the hem of her dress and palming her closer.

"It always started out with me slamming her up against surfaces, but funnily enough we'd always end up," Liam doesn't say any more, pressing her lip against Louis', light as a feather. She kisses her again and again, keeps it chase and sweet, teasing, and pulls away when Louis chases her for something deeper.

"Oh god, you should've said," Louis groans, fumbling to get the door open behind her.

They stumble through the door together, tripping over each other in their hurry. Louis tries to kick her shoes off and ends up kicking Liam in the shin which slows them down a bit, Louis insisting on spending an awful lot of time apologising by twisting her hand in Liam's hair and kissing her until she was similarly out of breath. The two of them almost break their ankles getting their shoes off on the move, keeping each other up only by the need to be touching all along each other. There's a moment of confusion where Louis and Liam both pull each other towards their separate rooms. Liam ends up winning, her expressive eyebrows suggesting they make good use of her proper huge bed.

"I did think you were cute, in a bookish school girl way," Louis says, not unkindly. She falls backwards onto the back, hooking her ankle over Liam's so they both go down together. They bounce a bit, Louis' making a winded noise, starting to laugh.

"Especially wanted to shut you the fuck up during your big speeches," Louis says, impatiently trying to get the button of Liam's shorts open with one hand. She curses as if she takes back every good thing she said about them all those hours ago. Liam sucks a stinging love bite against the column of her throat for that.

Louis makes this noise of disapproval, almost a whine, when Liam leans back to stand on her knees. She gets her shorts open herself, sliding them down her long legs and chucking them off the side of the bed. Liam leans back over her again, slotting their bare legs together and shuddering helplessly when Louis tucks her hands underneath her shirt, skating her fingertips lightly across her ribs. She licks at her bottom lip, pulling it into her mouth and rolls her hips, Liam gasping against her spit-slick mouth, following the rhythm effortlessly.

Louis wriggles out from underneath her, trying to kiss her the whole time and missing her mouth. She doesn't seem to mind though, little pecks at the underside of her chin, nuzzling her face against her neck like it's enough. Liam cups Louis' face in her hands, pulling her in for a kiss, slowing her down with strokes of her tongue until she calms a bit. Louis leans up to stare down at Liam, her eyes suddenly so blue, the only thing Liam can focus on (that's a lie, her thighs feel pretty fantastic around her own).

"Liam," she says breathlessly, the most serious she has been since the whole thing started. "Liam, what do you like?" she asks earnestly, stilling on top of her.

Liam's mouth falls open in silence, her heart beating wildly against her chest, enough for Louis to probably feel it. "I like _you_ ," Liam says helplessly honest, leaning up to land a kiss on her chin.

Louis blinks hard and becomes quiet, and Liam can't look away from her eyes if she tried. Liam suddenly feels naked and stripped raw, her blood heated and pumping feverishly with something along with the lust. But it doesn't last because Louis grins brilliantly down at her, the corners of her eyes crinkling and she looks gorgeous and happy and Liam can breathe again. Louis kisses her and it calms the humming in her skin. She trails her lips down the column of her throat, licking at the hollow of her throat, grazing her teeth against her collarbones.

Louis runs her thumb against the thin material of Liam's bra, up over the swell and rolls her nipple until it hardens. She licks at her nipple through her bra, flicking her tongue out against it and it's nowhere near enough to be anything but infuriating. Louis grins up at her when Liam arches herself off the bed, getting her own arms around her to try and unclasp her bra. She breathes out in relief when she gets it in one go, that never happens, and pulls it through her arms. She's still _nervous_ , she hasn't been with anyone but Andy in her _life_.

"Oh, babe," Louis says in a quiet, awed, voice, running her fingertips down the centre of her chest, stroking her sternum.

Louis glances up at her, her eyes smiling before she lowers her mouth, breathing out against her nipple. Liam arches up into it, nudging up against Louis' mouth and her grin turns wicked for a second before she ducks her head properly and takes it into her mouth. It's too much all of a sudden, from the almost nothing suction over her bra to the _wet heat_ of her mouth, her tongue going from wide, gentle strokes to lightning quick flicks. Liam tangles her fingers in Louis' hair, her lips shaped against the sounds escaping her mouth. Louis turns her head, kissing the inside of Liam's wrist, sweet, before paying the same attention to her other nipple.

Louis presses a sucking kiss to her sternum, just where her fingertips were a second again, and kisses her way down lower still. She strokes her palm down the flat of Liam's stomach, circling her belly button with the pad of her thumb and kissing the soft skin at her navel. She scrapes her teeth over the sharp jut of her hipbone, just over the waistband of her knickers and Liam whimpers, tries not to buck her hips like she wants to. Louis does it again, this time her thumb against the slickness of her panties, barely any pressure at all again. Louis makes a pleased noise, pushing her thumb in the slightest bit, at the easy slick give. Louis shuffles backwards, far enough to start kissing Liam's thigh. She starts off slowly, from the inside of her knee, stroking a finger up and down, light and feathery touches against her clit.

"Louis, Louis, Louis," Liam chants, trying to get her own fingers against her clit, to get any pressure at all.

Louis pushes her hand away, nipping at the skin high inside of her thigh, and pushes her thumb inside the seam of her panties now, getting at her hot, wet centre. She spreads it around, her thumb against her clit in slow circles and Liam curls her fists in the pillow, pushing against her hand.

"You okay, babe?" Louis asks, pulling her thumb out to suck it into her mouth, her lips swollen and _hungry_ around it.

"Oh fuck," Liam says and Louis kisses her again, hot and wet, against her other thigh - high enough to make Liam want to kick her. "Stop teasing," Liam whimpers, tries to keep the desperate edge out of her voice.

"I'm sorry, darling," Louis says, puckering her lips to kiss her over her knickers. "You just look so pretty."

Louis finally hooks her fingers into the waistband of Liam's knickers, pulling it down the length of her legs slowly. Liam pulls one of her feet out in a hurry, leaving them hanging on her other ankle and forgets to blush for how fuck- _stupid_ she's gone with Louis' darkened eyes on her. She looks so fucking gorgeous, her hair a tangled mess from Liam's hands, licking over her own lips. Louis does stop teasing, bites at the chord of muscle at the junction of her thigh momentarily before she gets her mouth on Liam, god her _mouth._ Liam's never come this embarrassingly fast, her thighs trying to squeeze together and fall apart at the same time and Louis keeps licking at her cunt, until she's a shivering wreck, two of Louis' fingers pressing inside her.

~

The first thing Louis sees when she manages to open her eyes is Liam, smiling, as if she's in absolutely awe that she made Louis come like that. Her fingertips are still pressing into her thigh hard enough to leave bruises, her other hand stroking her belly, her fingers still wet and Louis smiles right back.

~

Louis wakes up spooned up against Liam's back, their knees tucked together, her nose buried a the nape of her neck. Her good arm's gone dead and her other arm is in an awkward position and her neck has an awful crick in it but she's just warm _everywhere_ and she doesn't want to get out of bed ever. Liam must be awake because she turns her head slightly, trying to twist around to face Louis. Louis is not having any of it, holding tight onto her waist so they won't have to inevitably get up.

"Liam Payne," Louis says through a yawn, biting lightly on her shoulder. She climbs more firmly on top of her, flattening Liam onto the bed on her belly. "I just wanted to tell you I still respect you in the morning."

Liam laughs, soft and smothered into the pillow and _lovely_ , her shoulders shaking. Louis settles her whole weight on top of her, nosing along the side of her neck and up to her cheek. Liam's smile's peeking out of her pillow and Louis kisses her cheek, right before the corner of her smile.

"You're going to go for a jog, aren't you?" Louis asks morosely, determinately staying on top of her. She has a feeling she could talk Liam into staying in bed with her for the rest of the day if she acted fast enough but she's still all groggy from sleep and all she can do for now is physically keep her here.

"Yep," Liam says, pushing herself up and rolling over.

Louis has either the choice of being crushed unceremoniously underneath Liam's back (which isn't entirely unappealing) or moving out of the way. Louis flops onto her side of the bed on her back, making a face as Liam gets out of bed. She perks up again almost immediately, leaning up on her elbows so she can watch Liam pick out her underwear. She puts her sports bra on, her back to Louis and bends over again to rummage through her bottom drawer for her leggings. Louis might not appreciate the situation but she can sure as hell appreciate Liam Payne.

"You want to come?" Liam asks, pulling her hair into a high pony tail. Louis wonders if she could possibly convince her to go running in just her sports bra and leggings. Maybe if she spent the time to burn every one of Liam's shirts.

Louis laughs at the question, flopping backwards onto the back hard enough to bounce back up a bit. "Oh, you're serious," Louis says, watching in dismay as Liam pulls a shirt over her black sports bra. She stands there at the edge of the bed with her hands on her hips, raising her eyebrows down at Louis, a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth as much as she's attempting to suppress it.

"Aren't you sore?" Louis asks groaning. "Alright, alright, I've got to keep everyone off you with a bat," Louis says, finally clambering up into a sitting position, sounding like she's been burdened with this completely voluntary task. "You have the aura of well-fucked, my dear, it's very attractive."

She climbs out of bed and starts to look through Liam's clothes for something to wear since she can't be arsed to walk the short distance to her room. She pulls on a clean pair of Liam's knickers, taking a moment to stretch her arms out, her shoulders cracking in a satisfactory way. Louis reaches for one of Liam's large pyjama shirts, the Batman one, and pulls it on. Louis forgoes the shorts because she doubts her arse would fit into anything Liam would own.

"How'd you make every compliment apply to yourself as well?" Liam asks with a shake of her head, impressed.

"Practise makes perfect," Louis says, grabbing her beanie on the sofa and her skateboard on the way out of their flat. She looks rather like a lost orphan next to Liam in her full jogging kit. She trails sadly after Liam, the crisp morning air cutting into her legs. Louis keeps herself behind Liam, her eyes tracking her movement. Liam may have no arse to speak of but it's still a very nice bum.

"Aren't you supposed to be wearing a helmet?" Liam asks, spinning around to start jogging backwards.

Louis makes a face at Liam and mutters _show off_ under her breath. She feels winded all of a sudden, even if they haven't even run very far and Louis' just skating behind Liam very slowly, when Liam gives her a huge shit-eating grin with an accompanying wink. She pushes herself forward to try and pinch Liam's nipple through her sports bra but she evades it easily, turning out of the way and reaching for her hand. She slows down to a walk, swinging Louis' hand.

"Don't make me do stretches," Louis says, squeezing her hand.

"Ah, fuck it. I can't focus anyway," Liam says, taking in a huge deep breath and smiling around at the world in general.

"That's the spirit," Louis says in delight.

"I want to try skating," Liam says, toeing Louis' skateboard.

They end up going back home after a little while. Louis gets more exercise than she'd planned, holding onto both of Liam's hands and running down the pavement while she tried to keep her balance on the skateboard. She's out of breath, a stitch biting into her ribs with every breath, by the time they get back home and feels like she's been tricked into doing voluntary exercise.

"See, don't you feel better?" Liam asks, picking up the skateboard for her. She looks back at Louis' pitiful state and walks all the way back down to grab her hand and start manually pulling her up the stairs.

"I'm still injured, arsehole," Louis wheezes out, pulling her beanie off and throwing it at Liam.

"A soft cast, on your _wrist_ ," Liam says, tutting. She catches her beanie with her left hand and jams it onto her own head. "Speaking of, I could definitely help you shower."

The rawness in the back of her throat won't disappear and Louis decides she really needs to start playing football again because she still can't seem to catch her breath. Louis glares up at Liam who blinks innocently down at her, lifting the material of her shirt over her belly teasingly. Louis makes a totally involuntary growling noise at the back of her throat before she starts running up the stairs after her, trying to reach out and pinch her arse. Liam yelps, laughing as she runs away.

By the time Louis manages to catch up, Liam's already at the door trying to key it open. Louis plasters herself against Liam's back, hugging her waist tight and pressing her up against the door, her fingertips already edging past the waistband of her leggings.

~

"Louis, I can actually hear you pouting from my room - don't put any vodka in the sauce," Liam says, shouting down the hallway to be heard.

Louis pretends she hasn't heard anyway, making a face back at her as if she wasn't actually pouting a second ago. But before Louis can give this recipe a real quick fix (she read it about it on the internet, vodka spaghetti is definitely a _thing_ ), Liam runs into the kitchen with a spare apron in her hand, skidding along in her Captain America slippers Louis so graciously _bought_ her.

"Louis, _no_ ," Liam says with a disbelieving laugh.

Louis refuses to give up, hurriedly trying to tip the bottle into the pan of sauce. She's only half-serious about going through with it but it's mostly because she knows Liam's going to hurry over to her side and grab her wrist, circling her arms around Louis in an attempt to stop her.

"I swear to god, it's a thing!" Louis insists, trying (not very hard) to fight Liam off her back. She has no chance, of course, her hard cast has been exchanged for the soft kind so she can't really hit her with it.

"Nope," Liam says, freeing the bottle from Louis' grip. She averts her eyes from the look Louis has on her face (she's pouting again) and looks instead at the bottle, raising an eyebrow in contemplation. She shrugs to herself and raises the bottle to her lip, throwing her head back and swallowing. She coughs almost immediately, pulling the bottle as far away as from herself as she can, her eyes watering hard enough to make Louis start to laugh.

"So you're saying we should drink the vodka _now_ ," Louis says. She makes the universal hand gesture of _gimme_ , and Liam does so easily enough, still coughing and choking.

Louis has the bottle halfway to her mouth before she lowers it to continue laughing at Liam. Liam shakes her head, sniffling once she's stopped coughing and Louis _has_ to step forward and kiss the taste out of her mouth. She pulls back to kiss the tip of her reddened nose.

"Anything to save our dinner," Liam says, grabbing the bottle off Louis again and placing it on the counter.

She shakes out the spare apron she's fetched from her room, even if they've pretty much finished cooking and Louis' shirts ruined already. Louis lifts her arms up obediently and Liam reaches around her, wrapping the apron tie twice around her waist and fastening it into a bow at the small of her back. Louis wraps her arms around Liam's neck, holding her there even when she's done with the apron and grins helplessly into her hair.

Liam disappears off into the living room shortly after to set everything down on the coffee table. They could go ahead and try to be romantic or watch terrible reality telly while eating dinner, they obviously went with the reality shows. They've got cheap wine, an obscene about of spaghetti and neither of them are complaining.

Louis leans against the counter. She's supposed to be getting something but she can't remember, she's too busy thinking about taking Liam out on a proper date one day instead of just eating take away in their living room all the time. They could go to a real restaurant, get all dressed up too, or a picnic or to an amusement park or -

Louis almost jumps out of her skin as Liam's phone vibrates against the counter, loud against the sudden silence of the kitchen. She closes her eyes and breathes out slowly, holding her palm up to her hammering heart. Louis leans over to glance at the screen, her eyes widening as she takes in the caller. It's from Andy. Louis glances behind her, as if she expected Liam to be standing right behind her, and turns back to the phone, biting down on her bottom lip. She goes against her better judgement and reaches for the phone, holding it up against her ear.

"Liam, babe," Andy says immediately and he sounds so very grateful. "Thank you. I love you, please don't hang up."

Louis' mouth works silently for a second, spinning around in paranoia in case Liam's come back. "She's busy at the moment," Louis finally manages to say. She has no idea what she's playing at. She should never have picked up the phone in the first place. Louis winces at herself and considers just hanging up right then but Andy starts talking and a huge part of Louis just wants to hear what he could possibly have to say to Liam.

"Oh," he says, disappointed, "can you - can you tell her I called? I really need to talk to her, in person. Look, I've been a fucking idiot, anyone could tell you that and - it's over, it's over with Oli - alright, she's the love of my _life_ and I don't want to waste the love that we had, I - who is this?"

"Her roommate," Louis says, her throat suddenly dry.

"I'm sorry, can you just tell her to call me back?" Andy asks desperately.

"Yeah," Louis says, clearing her throat and hangs up.

She places the phone carefully on the counter, right where she found it and takes a few steps backwards as if it's going to jump at her. She leans against the counter, covering her mouth with one palm and tries not to panic but her thought's are all jumbled and she can't make sense of what should be a priority right now. Because, Louis' realises rather belatedly that, yeah, she's in love with Liam and it's like there's something ugly and huge clawing at the inside of her ribcage at the thought of _Andy_. She has to tell Liam either way, she has to tell her that Andy wants her back and she has to tell her she loves her and hope that she stays. Louis scrubs at her face, her chest hurts, she can feel everything slipping away before she ever really had a grip on it.

"Louis, the show's starting!" Liam calls out from the living room. "You're supposed to bring the sauce, by the way."

Louis makes up her mind. She's going to tell her because the possibility of losing Liam doesn't outweigh the possibility of loving her.

Liam glances up from the sofa when Louis walks into the living room, piling noodles onto their plates. She picks up her glass of wine and settles back onto the sofa, tucking her legs underneath her. "You okay?" she asks, raising an eyebrow at Louis.

"Yeah," Louis breathes out, taking a seat besides Liam. She tries to focus, trying to think of how she's going to articulate this, for it to be enough. She just needs to be honest. "Actually no, I need to talk to you."

"Uh-oh," Liam says, mirroring Louis from all those weeks ago, and grins at Louis.

Louis realises she's still got her apron on but she's too preoccupied to take it off now. She pulls at the edge of the fabric, her heart lodging in her chest. She looks up and Liam's still smiling at her, looking slightly confused and beginning to worry about whatever Louis' about to say. Louis leans forward and kisses her again, soft, and the possibility that this might be the last time makes panic bolt through Louis like lightning. She holds Liam's face in her hands and thinks _please don't hurt me_ and feels selfish for wanting it.

"Liam, I'm in lo-," Louis starts, her voice raw, but is abruptly caught off when Liam jumps off the sofa immediately.

"You forgot the sauce, silly," she says with a laugh, climbing over Louis' legs to get back to the kitchen before Louis can reach out and stop her.

Louis groans loudly, falling face first onto the sofa cushion, her hands clenched into fists. She counts down from ten, trying anything to calm her raging heartbeat. She's fucking terrified, the last time she told someone she loved them it felt like someone was cutting her open from the inside, starting with her heart and moving onto every other vital organ until she felt like a shell of a human being. But it's Liam, it's _Liam_. Louis stays there for a little while, trying to amp herself up again, bite the bullet. She has to be brave, she has to be, if she wants this as much as she does, she has to be vulnerable and there's always a risk she's going to get hurt.

Louis is so completely wrapped up in her own thoughts that that she doesn't realise Liam hasn't come back in a little while now. She raises her head off the sofa, crease marks edged into her cheek, and twists around to shout for Liam in the direction of the kitchen. The front door slams shut and Louis lifts herself off the sofa, looking over the back of it, wide-eyed and in disbelief. She finally gets up off the sofa, walking to the kitchen on wobbly legs even though she knows there's nobody there. Liam's phone isn't on the counter any more and neither is she.

~

Louis couldn't stay in the startling empty flat for another second. She feels sick, worse than before, her gut churning even if she hasn't had one sip of the vodka sitting on their kitchen counter. Louis grabs it on the way out, managing to stuff it on top of the few items of clothes she was able to push into her bag in a hurry. She doesn't grab her keys but leaves them in the bowl, alone, and shuts the door firmly behind her. It's cold out and Louis' not really dressed appropriately for the wind but she doesn't bother pulling a jumper out, just wipes at her runny nose and leaves the building.

She has no idea where she's going, she just knows it has to be anywhere but here. It's not like she's going to be able to sleep in her bed again or take a shower in her bathroom or make oatmeal in her coffee pot without being reminded of the absence of Liam. Every centimetre of that apartment is fucked now and Louis' going to have to move. All she wanted to do was save her flat and she can't think of anything else worse now, she just wants Liam instead of the awful rawness all down her throat, climbing cold into her chest.

Louis ends up calling Harry because she always ends up calling Harry. He's her best friend and so far nothing in the world seems to be capable of changing that and Louis will hold onto him with whatever she has, even if it hurt like it did. He comes out with no fuss and walks all the way out to sit with her near the harbour. They used to hang out here all the time, just the three of them, but Louis' not even capable of thinking about that at the moment.

Louis glances up in surprise, her head snapping up hard as Harry stumbles, almost falling over his own legs. He has his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his jacket, shivering against the cold. She unearths her own frozen hands from where she's been attempting to warm them up beneath her thighs and hurriedly wipes at her face.

"How long have you been here?" Harry asks, falling into the seat beside her immediately. "It's fucking freezing, Lou."

Louis shrugs and Harry raises his arm, waiting for Louis to lean into his side and settle in. She does, ducking her face down so he won't be able to get a good look at her and he wraps his arm around her, hugging her tight. He starts to rub at her arm, even when Louis elbows him in the stomach to stop fussing. She hasn't been able to call him when she was really upset, not for a while now, because he'd be able to figure out _why_ and that was the last thing she wanted him to do. Harry knows her better than anyone else in the planet and it was the only way she could keep him happy with Caroline - because he would never deliberately do anything that would hurt her so badly.

Harry's quiet for the moment and Louis can imagine what Niall would say in this situation, "what's this about then," - straight to the point, and how Josh would try to distract her with video games and Stan would wrap her up in his blankets and lie on top of her until she kicked him off. Louis' grateful for Harry. She gets her arm around his waist, under his jacket and over his thin shirt, snuggling into his side. He only kisses the top of her head and hums non-committally, his large hand palming at her shoulder. He's been so patient for something that was entirely out of his hands and she doesn't think he still fully understands why Louis was acting so distant but he loves her enough not to push.

"What is it? Can I help in any way?" Harry asks, mumbling low against her hair.

Louis shakes her head, biting down on her bottom lip hard enough to draw blood because she wants so desperately to say _I'm never going to be anyone's first choice, am I?_

Have it carved out of her, leave her hollow inside. She doesn't though because she doesn't want to voice out such a stupid _fact_. She doesn't want people to tell her that she's going to meet someone one day, that she just hasn't met the right person yet because she has, she _has_ , and it doesn't work like that. She doesn't want anybody else to be the right person but Liam. And the _right_ person, the _only_ person, couldn't love her like Louis did.

"C'mere," Harry says, and he sounds choked up, like he's experiencing every terrible feeling Louis is. He tugs her closer, wrapping both his arms around her and pulling her into his lap. She curls her arms around his neck, hides her face in his hair and Harry hugs her hard enough for it to hurt. Louis holds on just as tight, falls apart for a little while longer.

She can't do everything alone.

"Louis, I love you so much," Harry says, his voice breaking and Louis is still consumed with guilt for the past few months. "And you've been hurting and I just want to make it stop."

She nods against his shoulder, kissing his jaw and says, "I know, I know, I'm sorry. I love you too." _Thanks for not giving up on me._

Harry loosens his grip on her after a while, letting Louis settle back into his side, her legs still splayed over his lap. He reaches over with one of his long legs to touch his toe against her overnight bag. "Do you need a place to stay?" he asks.

Louis rests her cheek against his chest, against his steady heartbeat, and breathes in his familiar cologne. She shakes her head against him, her first curling in the material of his shirt.

Her voice is quiet. "Can you just stay with me for a bit?"

"Any time," Harry says, tangling his fingers in her hair.

They watch the sun rise together, Louis' legs over Harry's, her head resting against his shoulder.

~

Louis goes back home early next morning. Harry walks her all the way there, complaining about how the bottle of vodka is digging into his back. She tries to hold onto the feeling of warmth generating from Harry this morning, tries to wear it like an armour against everything else. She's sick of avoiding people, trying to avoid pain because it was inevitable and it always seems to end up so much worse. Louis sucks in a breath, resting her forehead against the door, closes her eyes and wonders what it would have been like if she didn't get fired and could make her rent and Liam didn't move in with her in the first place. She shuts down that train of thought quickly enough, she'd choose this every single time.

Louis has to knock on the door since she didn't bring her keys, she thought she wouldn't be coming back for a little while at the very least. Not while Liam was moving her stuff out, breaking it off bit by bit like she had to do so long ago. The door opens almost immediately to reveal Liam standing there with wide, blood-shot eyes, her mouth dropping open.

"Where have you been, Lou? I was so fucking worried," she says, her voice thick.

Louis opens her mouth without any idea what she's going to say. She doesn't get a chance to answer because Liam's pulling her into their flat, shutting the door behind her. She presses Louis up against it straight away and Louis goes easily, limp with surprise. Liam cups her face as gently as her lips against hers.

"I thought you - I called you a billion times," Liam says, her eyes closed, pressing her forehead against Louis'.

"Liam, what are you doing?" Louis asks, confusion clawing hot inside her body.

Liam's eyes open and she flinches back as if she's been slapped across the face. She takes a step back, her hands dropping from Louis' face.

"No, I didn't mean," Louis says desperately, her body following Liam on it's own accord, as if it's been trained to need her. She grabs Liam's wrist before she can back away any further and changes the order of the conversation from last night. "Andy called."

"I know," Liam says, her eyebrows furrowing on confusion. "I went out to see him last night, to give him his ring back."

"You can't, you _can't_ get back with him and still expect me to - wait, you what?" Louis asks, stumbling over her slippers left ready near the doorway to get closer to Liam. Louis can hear the blood suddenly rushing in her ears, her body understanding before she does.

"I'm not getting - I didn't want to keep his ring," Liam says, her eyes widening. Her hands settle around Louis' waist, steadying her.

"I thought you were getting back together with him," Louis says, her mouth dry. She feels like she's been dropped into the deep end of the pool and she can hear her heavy heartbeat crashing along. "You're still in love with him."

"I'm in love with _you_ , Lou," Liam says, her eyebrows wriggling like they're having trouble settling on one expression. "It's _you_ , I love _you_ ," Liam says again, gasping out a laugh. She pulls her closer, says it again as if it'd make Louis understand.

"Oh thank god," Louis says, falling against Liam, kissing the curve of her smile. "I thought you were," Louis' chest hitches uncontrollably and she pulls back to tuck her chin against Liam's shoulder, hugging her close. "I thought you were leaving me."

"Can't get rid of me that easily, love," Liam says, kissing her cheek, her ear. She lifts Louis' chin with her index finger, kisses the corner of her trembling lips.

"I love you too," Louis says.

Louis never expected to be laughing during this confession but she does, pure joy, pressing it into Liam's skin for her to keep.

_Epilogue_

There's warmth coiling in tendrils from her very centre and it only makes Liam blink sleepily, her legs twisting together underneath her chair, her skin hot to the touch and satisfied. Louis carefully places the cup of tea in front of her, her hand tangling in Liam's hair for just a moment. Liam nudges her cheek against it, her eyes slowly closing and smiles blindly up at her.

"Drink your tea, babe," Louis says at the same time there's a knocking on the door.

Louis turns to get it and Liam wishes she could stay in bed for a little longer. Liam has a job interview today, the one Louis made her apply for when she was too chicken shit to do it herself, but it's not until later in the afternoon. Zayn and Harry said they were coming over to help her dress and prepare for it though and Louis has to go to work today. Liam can hear them in the hallway now and she smiles to herself.

She takes another sip of her tea, sighing in satisfaction.

It takes a short moment.

Liam's eyes slam open and her cup lands on the table with a thump. "Louis, are you weaning me off sugar in my tea with _sex_?"

~

Liam's watching YouTube videos on her laptop and messaging with Perrie about what it takes to adopt a puppy in the living room when Louis comes home. She's spent the whole day with Harry doing God knows what, Liam's always too afraid to ask, and she hasn't seen her all day. Liam can hear her throw the key, wincing when it ricochets off the wall and slam into the bowl. She crashes her shoulder into the corner as per usual and does a run-up into the living room, belly-flopping onto the sofa and smashing her chin against Liam's thigh. Liam is well-rehearsed in Louis by now and has moved her laptop onto the arm of the sofa just in time.

"Louis!" Liam says in protest, trying to rub at her thigh.

Louis' already doing it for her, rubbing her face against the material of Liam's leggings with a content little hum. Liam's worn them out to run errands during the morning and then to lunch with Jade and Perrie. She rolled around with their puppy enough at the park afterwards to probably still be covered in fur. She doesn't see how Louis could be so happy to be nuzzling her.

"Liam!" Louis says enthusiastically, mimicking Liam. She gets her arm around Louis' waist, tugging her down so she could use her belly like a pillow and rest her cheek against it.

"You're getting make-up on my shirt," Liam says, her stomach hardening because she's deliberately rubbing her cheek against her stomach now and it tickles but she's not going to give Louis the satisfaction of laughing. She doesn't need the encouragement. Louis makes a sound that confirms she hasn't really heard whatever Liam's said or she has and she's going to ignore it anyway.

Liam looks down at her head fondly, resting her hand against her hair. She can't imagine anything better than this, can't bear to think of how it used to be when she wanted it so much and couldn't explain why. Liam trails her hand down the back of her neck, slipping easily underneath the wide collar of Harry's shirt. She rubs her palm against the warm skin between her shoulder blades, scratching lightly with her nails to hear Louis practically purr. She lifts her head to press a kiss against Liam's belly and rests against Liam again.


End file.
